What would you say are the best old-school cyberpunk video games?
Note that I don’t actually care if it’s the “best”, I’m just looking for some fun older games to play. So give me something better than Raid 2020 and I’ll call it a win.
I’m thinking things like:
- Snatcher (1988)
- Blade Runner (1997)
- System Shock 2 (1999)
- Deus Ex (2000)
And just to prove they don’t have to be GOTY contenders…
- Slave Zero (2000)
- Shadowrun (1994)
- X-Kaliber 2097 (1994)
So yeah, give me some recommendations from the NES/SNES/N64 era (I’m not convinced there’s anything worth playing from the ZX Spectrum/Commodore 64 era). Maybe some Arcade (MAME) games too? I can’t think of any cyberpunk arcade games.
I’ve never played Omikron: The Nomad Soul or BloodNet before. Not sure if they’re worth my time.
I always had a soft spot for DreamWeb.
Not 20 years old, but if you’re willing to look at 10, I’ll always shout out the often-overlooked Remember Me by DONTNOD, back before they did Life is Strange.
It’s a 3rd person action-adventure game set in a cyberpunk future where everyone has a cybernetic implant called the SenSen in their brain to allow all their memories to be uploaded into cloud, so they can revisit them whenever they want. Of course, this technology is the property of one corporation, Memorize, but I’m sure they wouldn’t do anything evil with the ability to read and store every memory of every person connected to the system, right? You play as Nilin, a former memory hacker with some bad amnesia, who is broken out of prison by unknown benefactors with their own agenda. Navigate the streets and slums of 2084 Paris, avoiding hit squads and breaking into memories to piece together your own fractured past.
Definitely a solid B-tier game, it didn’t blow anyone’s mind on release, but it’s decently fun to play, has an interesting story, and the atmosphere of the cyberpunk city is just perfect. Plus, it gets pretty damn cheap come sale times. I can’t recommend it enough for anyone with a love of cyberpunk and mid-tier games with heart making up for the lack of budget.
Nobody is going to say it here? I really, really like Syndicate. The original one.