Folks, thanks for the books indications for CP2020 setting details. I will take a look at them.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;1007943That's useful information. Some games play/seem vastly different depending on whether you are playing core-only or all-the-expansions (or somewhere between, which will inherently depend on which books you use).

Agreed!

Quote from: JeremyR;1007603I always thought so. I never really bought into Cyberpunk, either the original 2013 or 2020 versions. It seemed more like they watched Bubblegum Crisis and ripped it off.

Shadowrun, though a completely ridiculous premise (though I do remember that Mayan calender stuff being big), seemed to be more real. More coherent, believable universe, despite the magic and tolkien races. Maybe it helped that it had so many novels.

Emphasis mine. That's the weird thing about Shadowrun. It's central premise is almost tongue-in-cheek ridiculous but it's execution feels very real and verosslimile, as you say. The national tensions in Treaty of Denver that made the city almost WW2 Berlin-like, the rise of amerindians from reservations and the culture clash that issued, the night of rage and racial violence, the corporate council fucking up the world (and themselves), etc. It's like this setting is just 2 minutes from us, it's very relatable, very... human? While CP2020 always sounded so "out there" to me with it's points of light urban enclaves surrounded by toxic wastelands everywhere. Maybe I expressed myself badly in the OP. Maybe the quality I see in Shadowrun has nothing to do with the cyberpunk genre, but with our own world, how approachable it feels from our reality.

Then maybe CP2020 also has these qualities and I just didn't read the right books. Who knows. I will try to rectify this up to the weekend. It will be a fun exercise.

Quote from: Itachi;1007835What Cyberpunk2020 books describe the setting and it's social issues in more detail?

Hands down, "Home of the Brave" - the America sourcebook. Arguably, 80% of the book is fluff describing in detail the history of America and how it operates in 2020, including details on how the government really works, and how each strata of society operates. In terms of running CP2020 - I consider this book indispensable. It gets down to the nitty-gritty economics of what average people can expect and you adjust your game accordingly. There are nice rules for creating military characters, lots of little mechanical side-bars, but for a GM wanting a good snapshot of how fuuucked up America is - this is it.

Edit: I would also include - for street-level stuff- 'Wildside' the Fixer book and 'Serve and Protect' the Cop book as bookends. This way you understand exactly how crime cartels/gangs/organizations operate and what law-enforcement will bring to the table. Both extremely useful  for fleshing out your game.

As a side-note: I'd recommend giving a look at Interface-Zero 2.0 for a REALLY well done modern cyberpunk setting that is a wealth of material to be mined or used straight up.


Edit 2: if anyone cares - CP2020 is cyberpunk. Shadowrun is cyberpunk with magic. What makes something "cyberpunk" is up to the GM enforcing their ideas of cyberpunk onto the game. The question I always have - is does magic in Shadowrun inherently make it *more* cyberpunk? My answer is no. It's just a conceit of the game shoe-horned, however well done, into the genre. I'm of the opinion that GM's affect genre fidelity far more than any particular rule-set GENERALLY.

Quote from: tenbones;1007965Edit 2: if anyone cares - CP2020 is cyberpunk. Shadowrun is cyberpunk with magic. What makes something "cyberpunk" is up to the GM enforcing their ideas of cyberpunk onto the game. The question I always have - is does magic in Shadowrun inherently make it *more* cyberpunk? My answer is no. It's just a conceit of the game shoe-horned, however well done, into the genre. I'm of the opinion that GM's affect genre fidelity far more than any particular rule-set GENERALLY.

If Shadowrun is cyberpunk with magic, then Dark Sun is cyberpunk with magic and psionics replacing technology.

Quote from: jeff37923;1007984If Shadowrun is cyberpunk with magic, then Dark Sun is cyberpunk with magic and psionics replacing technology.

OK. Agreed.

Quote from: jeff37923;1007984If Shadowrun is cyberpunk with magic, then Dark Sun is Shadowrun with magic and psionics replacing technology.

Corrected.

Quote from: tenbones;1007996Corrected.

As a game, I agree. As a genre, I disagree.

Cyberpunk 2020 with magic/supernatural is Night's Edge with its Lovecraftian overtones.

With Cyberpunk 2020 predating Political Correctness, and Pondsmith's lack of racial hangups or animosity, I feel CP2020 has a sort of innocence or naivete about it that makes the setting rather preferable to the real world of 2017. It has a really strong '80s vibe (even more than Neuromancer) - it's a dystopian vision but written in a better time and place. A bit like Streets of Fire, it's fundamentally optimistic.

The thing about Shadowrun that makes it good Cyberpunk and even better science fiction is, ironically, the fantasy elements because they function similarly to the alien elements in Star Trek.  They serve as metaphor, as masks that both, because they are superficially inhuman and fantastic, let Shadowrun cut deeper in the social commentary and exploration of the technological impact, and escape the charge of proselytizing and preaching because of the cover the fantasy element provides.

Quote from: S'mon;1008013With Cyberpunk 2020 predating Political Correctness, and Pondsmith's lack of racial hangups or animosity, I feel CP2020 has a sort of innocence or naivete about it that makes the setting rather preferable to the real world of 2017. It has a really strong '80s vibe (even more than Neuromancer) - it's a dystopian vision but written in a better time and place. A bit like Streets of Fire, it's fundamentally optimistic.

This thread merely highlights the dystopian reality that is 2017. We're so fucked.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1008023The thing about Shadowrun that makes it good Cyberpunk and even better science fiction is, ironically, the fantasy elements because they function similarly to the alien elements in Star Trek.  They serve as metaphor, as masks that both, because they are superficially inhuman and fantastic, let Shadowrun cut deeper in the social commentary and exploration of the technological impact, and escape the charge of proselytizing and preaching because of the cover the fantasy element provides.

I'm working on digesting this, but I'm having a hard time. Could you give me an example of this in Shadowrun?

Quote from: jeff37923;1008029I'm working on digesting this, but I'm having a hard time. Could you give me an example of this in Shadowrun?

At a guess:  taking the fantastic elements as proxies for real world problems allows discussions of said real world problems without being quite so pointed and hurty to people sensitive about issues.  So by talking about Humanis Policlubs (racist against Elves and Trolls and shit) vs talking about the Ku Klux Klan (racist against black people), you can have a theoretically more nuanced conversation than you could if you just talked about the KKK.

I think that one problem with this theory is that in Star Trek they generally WERE talking about taboo subjects at the time, genuninely controversial positions regarding racism, while in Shadowrun you can just swap out the Humanis Policlub for the KKK and nothing is lost or gained for 99% of the game buying public.

But that's my guess about what he meant, plus my commentary on it.

Perhaps we need to define WHAT is cyberpunk before drawing battle lines between the two games.

I am currently re-reading Neuromancer and working on cyberRPG so this topic is very interesting.

Quote from: S'mon;1008013A bit like Streets of Fire, it's fundamentally optimistic.

I loved that movie!

[video=youtube;wCIrPJ6SBl4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCIrPJ6SBl4[/youtube]

Quote from: Itachi;1007597The talk in the other thread got me thinking. I've read once that cyberpunk as a genre is the projection of our anxieties and fears as a society. If that's so, could we say Shadowrun, for all its fantasy trappings, is a better example of cyberpunk than Cyberpunk 2020 and most other games in the genre?

Maybe I've not read the right sourcebooks for CP2020 but it always seemed to me too focused on the punk attitude and style and boobs and chrome while forgetting to deal with the society "anxieties". While Shadowrun is full of those, from the way megacorps are depicted in it's workings and exploitations or society and environment, the metahuman racial violence/prejudice (Humanis anyone?) to issues of urban security/organization (arcologies, enclaves, anarchist states), individual liberty (SINners vs SINless), etc. Even the central premise of shadowrunners tells something about corporate culture using human beings as disposable tools.

Thoughts?

Shadowrun is sick. 5th ed is a really great edition to be picking up. First real intro to it was skimming 4th ed at an friend's game to understand what the fuck was going on and... did not really like the book all that much. And believe me, I've got a knack for quality games and GM'ing them with even more quality too (fuck, 'don't have to believe me, the proof is right there in my fucking sig!). 4th just on instinct read as "broken to shit". 5th has got some shitty coverage of some of the more interesting concepts like Technomancers and The World Outside Seattle (tm) but honestly, shit reads right and the engine powering the system serves the granular nature of what it's trying to achieve well (some asshat did a crappy review complaining about the math because he doesn't like mental math -- I've seriously never understood that position).

Anyway, Market Panic is one of the best supplements you'll find for any game series. I read that shit like a storybook (which it really was) and what it really gets is that, yeah, there's fears and that, yeah, there's so much dystopian bullshit going on. But the beauty of it is that it really gets across "humanity is still here, we're still dominating, we're getting ours and we always will". Cyberpunk stops being cyberpunk when it gets bogged down in the "the world is shit and everyone is wired, missing an eye, a slave to the corps, scared of 'rent calls' from local gang and can't go anywhere without being heavily armed". This is something which WH40K, containing significant elements of the genre, suffers severely from and I can't say many settings other than Shadowrun avoid this. There's still real shit going on in that world, real stories being told. That doesn't happen naturally in many other games so, to its credit, Shadowrun deserves its place as cyberpunk done right -- and managing to do so while injecting copious fantasy elements in there too!

Quote from: Spike;1007617Wait... if I'm reading this right you are saying that Cyberpunk is less 'cyberpunk' than Shadowrun because of Racism?

Maybe... just maybe... Mike Pondsmith (a black guy, which is only relevant because of your weird thesis there), at least in the late 80's and early 90's, didn't think that Racial Anxiety was one of the big social anxieties of the day?   And honestly? I can't think of much, if any, cyberpunk literature in which Racism was the big social anxiety being addressed.

Lets look at your other social anxieties then.

Corporations run Amok*:  By The Gods! Cyberpunk 2020 HAS THEM!  The Military has been replaced by private contractor megacorporations like Militech! (or Arasaka, if you are in Japan and a number of third world nations). The Government practically doesn't exist! Admittedly, CP2020 doesn't quite go Full Robocop regarding police, the way Shadowrun does, but that seems an awfully small hill to die on.

The Environment:  Admittedly, unlike you (OP), I HAVE Read All THe Sourcebooks, so oddly I can't say that the main book does or doesn't deal with this per se, but Yes, Virginia, Environmental Destruction is very much a part of the CP2020 setting.  While you don't so much have food riots (or at least not as hyped as Shadowrun), toxic waste dumps and murdering of Nomad Clans camped on Illegal Dump Sites (See Corporations above!) is very much part of the setting.

Arcologies: Got 'em.

Sinners vs Sinless: Well, not in those terms, but what the fuck do you think Nomads are? The dispossessed 'unpersons', scavenging their own way across a practically post-apocalyptic wasteland, exploited by the Corporations.  The constant dehumanizing of hte bottom of society is just as much a theme in CP2020, perhaps moreso given the excessive emphasis on people as consumer units (Style vs Substance).

Shadowrunners: THis one is just silly. The concept of Shadowrunners/Running is nothing more than putting a lable on "Player Characters". Cyberpunk 2020 has Shadowrunning, they just don't call it that, or really much of anything, which arguably makes it more realistic than 'Shadowrun'.

The butthurt attitude in your post does it a disservice when some of what you've written is pretty legit.

Your bit on racism is stupid because cyberpunk is a pretty white subgenre. It deals extensively with the (in their minds) existential threat to the white man's existence in a world where everything  has gone to shit (which doesn't really matter here) and the yellow people have taken over and now dominate their lives. That's pretty integral to the subgenre. It's a very caucasian look at the world.

SINless are in the system just not officially. Near majority of the world is SINless -- something like 20, maybe -- very generously -- 30% max of the world is recognized (not including Criminal SINers which is far worse than just being plain SINless) and even in that decidedly minor population, only about less 5% are full Corporate SINers. That's maybe less than half a billion (and probably much lower, considering much of the world is nuclear/toxic/magical wasteland). Still, the vast majority of people are based out of sprawls, megacities, arcologies and enclaves. Even the Syndicate computer game reboot touches on this right in its intro because its so integral to understanding that, even though the population count is just ridicuously high, nomads aren't really a thing anymore. That's an aspect 2020 really fucked up.

Police aren't at all Robocop-ish in Shadowrun. Really, they're pretty apathetic unless it's something their employer cares about. They're just the cyberpunk equivalent of a noble house guard retinue. Albeit way more ridiculously armed than even Boddicker could ever dream of. That's where that "police are just another gang" really kicks in for me. Other than that, you're on point with the rest of that part.

Quote from: Omega;1007616If you havent allready then have a look at Nights Edge. It was a setting book and some adventures for CP2020 that added supernatural threats. Really well done and some of the adventures are pretty good.

As for CP vs SR. Its a matter of how you play them and how much of the setting from either you keep or jettison.
Id say about 75% or more of the SR sessions Ive played in have had the supernatural elements toned down. Its there, but much more in the background which gives SR a much more cyberpunk feel. As for CP2020. Like SR its a very broad setting allowing for all manner of styles and approaches from the entertainment sector to the crime to the law enforcement to the corporate to whatever you want.

Punk is the name of the game for 2020. Shadowrun, in all honesty, is dark sci-fi and dark fantasy and punk is just an aesthetic, if even that. 2020 eschews DIY-ethos for stylistic excess. Shadowrun really nails living life for people in the world where 2020 is just built from movie scenes. Both of them are guilty of non-purist bullshit.

Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007632To me, Shadowrun is a rather safe, almost twee representation of the cyberpunk genre. It's not just the addition of Tolkienesque fantasy, but also the very tropes within the game are designed to be familiar, rather than transgressive and iconoclastic.

Cyberpunk itself hasn't really aged well as a game, but then it hasn't been updated half as many times as Shadowrun has. The longtime wait for the mooted Cyberpunk 2077 would do something about that, but until it does, Shadowrun will remain the big seller in the hobby without much challenge. That said, I prefer Judge Dredd....

Judge Dredd America graphic novel was spectacular. It made the setting and character for me (and I really shouldn't have been reading the age I was) but everything else is a let down. Seriously. But then, I'm a picky bastard with excellent taste so whatever...

You're totally right on the aging part. I'm not into the 80's aesthetic even though it's still quite a popular throwback. The 90's is where it's at and honestly, shit's more relevant for cyberpunk in a modern setting because it was a watershed time in recent human -- at least, developed world -- history and, as we now know, was leading to very dark times ahead with the foundations laid violently and brutally (#civilwarmadness #newequalitygap) in-between the awesome explosion of culture, diversity and tech world over

Also, you really used the word twee. I'm just mad you used that word, hah hah.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1007633Twee... as in "excessively or affectedly quaint, pretty, or sentimental" or "affectedly or excessively dainty, delicate, cute, or quaint"?

That's one I never would have seen coming.

Forum peeps still use verisimilitude and fiat like they actually mean what they think they mean.

Quote from: TrippyHippy;1007636Absolutely it is. Shadowrun sells because it has pretty art and appeals in a quaint, sentimental way towards safe fantasy tropes. The actual cyberpunk tropes are also now just reassuring cliches rather than ideas that test out traditional sci-fi norms. So, yes, it's twee.

It has a lot of ugly or passable art from what I've seen. That said, focusing on neo-apartheid ideologues and iconoclastic body dysmorphia in art isn't really something you're going to see people want test -- even though, that is exactly what punk is now and its way darker and really not #surburbanpurgatoryreaction like it used to be.

Seriously, even Eclipse Phase stays in comparatively comfortable transgender-norm turf because you can sell that and people can escape.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1007638Huh, having a huge art budget and marketed by FASA, Microsoft and other companies with money to get artists like Elmore and Tim Bradstreet had nothing to with it I guess. :rolleyes:

Bradstreet art pretty...yeah that...well, speaks for itself.

Meaning what?  You're one of those that thinks Cyberpunk is "over" because iPhones?

Edit: You could be talking about Catalyst Shadowrun I guess.

DUDDDDDEEEEEEE... I had no idea that dude was the art dude.

Bradstreet is Vampire. That artwork tho'...

NERD BONER!

Quote from: Warboss Squee;1007655Pretty sure 5th edition shitcanned the transhuman themes entirely. Hell, half of the new fluff was meant to roll the feel of the game back 3 editions.

Shadowrun nowadays is about as punk as my little pony.

Interesting. I did note there was very little transhuman elements in the book. Caught some in the above-mentioned supplement too but it was like a couple lines of dialogue in one of the flavor texts for -- if I remember right -- EVO.

Quote from: KingCheops;1007766Yeah it's pretty important to delineate which edition of Shadowrun is being discussed here.  The different line developers had different styles.  Mulvihill's Shadowrun ain't Weissman's Shadowrun ain't Hardy's Shadowrun .

Whoever did 5th Ed is the Shadowrun I like.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;1007834That's not just a problem with Cyberpunk, it's science fiction in general.  Honestly, we've got a lot of technological advances that we didn't think of back then that is making it hard to actually do anything science fiction.  Cybernetics for example has been superseded for body part replacement, simply because it's easier to clone and runs the less risk of rejection.  We have contact lenses that give people their own HUD detailing their blood sugar levels for diabetics.

Hell, even movies are having a hard time to think of world shaking technological trends, simply because the future IS now.

Nah, the shit we're thinking of now completely blows two decades ago out the water. Nano-roll computers (Black Ops 2 gave that a public face), DNA imprinting, 3D printing, real camouflage (not that Predator energize bullshit -- it's the real scary hide-a-tank shit!), smart contracts, new economies, neo-patronage, super-angels, cashless stores, hunter-seeker cancer busters, drone warfare, the list is endless...

Quote from: Christopher Brady;1007928I did.  Both of them, and you know what I noticed in the books?  Scope.

Cyberpunk 20202 typically focused on small, personal situations, or a single city, whereas Shadowrun gave a wide overview of politics first.

So CP2020 started small and tried to go big (With mixed success, the British and Eastern books were mostly crap), while Shadowrun went big and then tried to narrow itself down to places like Seattle, Denver and the like, but usually ended up focusing at the national to state level,

This is on-point. Again, The World Outside Seattle (tm).

Quote from: Itachi;1007951Emphasis mine. That's the weird thing about Shadowrun. It's central premise is almost tongue-in-cheek ridiculous but it's execution feels very real and verosslimile, as you say. The national tensions in Treaty of Denver that made the city almost WW2 Berlin-like, the rise of amerindians from reservations and the culture clash that issued, the night of rage and racial violence, the corporate council fucking up the world (and themselves), etc. It's like this setting is just 2 minutes from us, it's very relatable, very... human? While CP2020 always sounded so "out there" to me with it's points of light urban enclaves surrounded by toxic wastelands everywhere. Maybe I expressed myself badly in the OP. Maybe the quality I see in Shadowrun has nothing to do with the cyberpunk genre, but with our own world, how approachable it feels from our reality.

Then maybe CP2020 also has these qualities and I just didn't read the right books. Who knows. I will try to rectify this up to the weekend. It will be a fun exercise.

The Amerindian stuff was bullshit. I remember reading they got into the shit from a few outspoken Native American figures who were pissed at the "ghost people" portrayal. Plus that and the fact the population growth and takeover would never, ever happen (the closest analogue we've got is Israel and maybe South Sudan and look how those are turning out...). Not that the designers cared, feather headdresses and tomahawks and Great Eagles are coooool!

Quote from: tenbones;1007965Hands down, "Home of the Brave" - the America sourcebook. Arguably, 80% of the book is fluff describing in detail the history of America and how it operates in 2020, including details on how the government really works, and how each strata of society operates. In terms of running CP2020 - I consider this book indispensable. It gets down to the nitty-gritty economics of what average people can expect and you adjust your game accordingly. There are nice rules for creating military characters, lots of little mechanical side-bars, but for a GM wanting a good snapshot of how fuuucked up America is - this is it.

Edit: I would also include - for street-level stuff- 'Wildside' the Fixer book and 'Serve and Protect' the Cop book as bookends. This way you understand exactly how crime cartels/gangs/organizations operate and what law-enforcement will bring to the table. Both extremely useful  for fleshing out your game.

As a side-note: I'd recommend giving a look at Interface-Zero 2.0 for a REALLY well done modern cyberpunk setting that is a wealth of material to be mined or used straight up.


Edit 2: if anyone cares - CP2020 is cyberpunk. Shadowrun is cyberpunk with magic. What makes something "cyberpunk" is up to the GM enforcing their ideas of cyberpunk onto the game. The question I always have - is does magic in Shadowrun inherently make it *more* cyberpunk? My answer is no. It's just a conceit of the game shoe-horned, however well done, into the genre. I'm of the opinion that GM's affect genre fidelity far more than any particular rule-set GENERALLY.

I need to check out Interface Zero, I really should. Shame it's Savage Worlds (not that I can talk, I got the damm Deluxe book in my collection, but hey, I prefer hardcovers, whaddya gonna do?).

What I would like to see is more of a focus on Lifestyle. I'm a millennial and proud of it and the thing that I really don't get is that lack of focus on it. That would really resonate with me personally but I think on a whole for my generation too. We worry about that kind of shit and we really do want a better lifestyle for ourselves. We grew up in that sweet spot between the "job for life" nostalgia of Gen X (which cyberpunk drills into and subverts, obvs) and "convenience factor" entitlement of Gen Z. We see we grew up when the digital revolution was happening, we lived the changes that Shadowrun tries to future-past-speak in its narrative, we saw how life was and we can clearly see what life could be. 'Cept we're in the position to change shit because we don't have the hangups of the former and we have the experience that the latter doesn't have. We know that we can change our place and we genuinely as a entire generation believe that we should and fuck anyone who tries to tell us we can't or who doesn't understand why we would.

I mean, dude, I grew up Low, I'm Middle now (entirely through my own effort and ambition) I want at least High and I'm gunin' for Luxury.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1008023The thing about Shadowrun that makes it good Cyberpunk and even better science fiction is, ironically, the fantasy elements because they function similarly to the alien elements in Star Trek.  They serve as metaphor, as masks that both, because they are superficially inhuman and fantastic, let Shadowrun cut deeper in the social commentary and exploration of the technological impact, and escape the charge of proselytizing and preaching because of the cover the fantasy element provides.

100%

Also, anything claiming to be cyberpunk with this as part of its soundtrack gets the thumbs up from me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx4zAGBQ-kE

If I can't feel the lights gone down low as the credits roll in the cinema, it's failed to capture the mood (but then, that's a theme in pretty everything I do so...) .

Quote from: S'mon;1008013With Cyberpunk 2020 predating Political Correctness, and Pondsmith's lack of racial hangups or animosity, I feel CP2020 has a sort of innocence or naivete about it that makes the setting rather preferable to the real world of 2017. It has a really strong '80s vibe (even more than Neuromancer) - it's a dystopian vision but written in a better time and place. A bit like Streets of Fire, it's fundamentally optimistic.

The fact that it's preferable to the real world is indicative of why I wouldn't use it as a modern cyberpunk example. I just think of it as "20XX" style 80's schlock.

Quote from: Spike;1008031At a guess:  taking the fantastic elements as proxies for real world problems allows discussions of said real world problems without being quite so pointed and hurty to people sensitive about issues.  So by talking about Humanis Policlubs (racist against Elves and Trolls and shit) vs talking about the Ku Klux Klan (racist against black people), you can have a theoretically more nuanced conversation than you could if you just talked about the KKK.

I think that one problem with this theory is that in Star Trek they generally WERE talking about taboo subjects at the time, genuninely controversial positions regarding racism, while in Shadowrun you can just swap out the Humanis Policlub for the KKK and nothing is lost or gained for 99% of the game buying public.

But that's my guess about what he meant, plus my commentary on it.

OK, but I don't think that racism explored that way is part of the cyberpunk genre. A core tenant of the cyberpunk genre is how people use technology. For Cyberpunk 2020, what good is dividing people up by race when cheap bodysculpting and skin pigmentation changers can make anyone look like any race they choose, even fantasy races can be chosen as a "race" and the person getting the body modifications can then become that "race" for however long it suits them.  Identity politics takes on a whole new dimension thanks to technology.

Exploring racism by using stand-ins like orcs and elves in Shadowrun just reminds me of the stupid idea that orcs in fantasy gaming are actually representative of African natives to be killed by evil colonials.