From: CS341A002@Husky1.StMarys.Ca (Loki)
Subject: cyberpunk
Organization: The Underground
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 14:21:28 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.13.SMU

jacobus@symphony.cc.purdue.edu writes:
>CS341A002@Husky1.StMarys.Ca (Loki) writes:
>>Quoting the Dark Conspiracy rulebook: "a horror game, not science-fiction."
>>Seeing as cyberpunk is a form of SF, I think that makes it pretty clear. ;)
>
>Ah, but what if one does not see cyberpunk as a form of SF but as a form
>of the horror genre with a technocratic veneer?  After all, there is as much
>of Film Noir in cyberpunk as there is "SciFi".  The direct ancestor of the
>cyberpunk genre is the gothic horror.  Cyberpunk owes as much to Frankenstein
>as to The Foundation Trilogy (in fact, more).  

   Really? I always got the idea that most cyberpunk authors were directly
influenced by Philip K. Dick, J.G. Ballard, and miscellaneous other New
Wave S.F. authors... (including Brunner, esp. "The Shockwave Rider")

   This argument would seem to be backed up by:
     A) They've read all these authors;
     B) The Philip K. Dick Award has generally gone to support cyberpunk
        authors in recent years.

   What's more, Neuromancer, commonly accepted as the Main Book that
created the cyberpunk genre, won the Hugo, Nebula and Philip K. Dick
awards. *ALL* of those are SF awards. I'd say that characterizes it as SF.

>To be blunt, as good a case for cyberpunk being horror with techno-trappings
>could be made as otherwise, and I'm not the first person to make it.  

   Really? ... Isn't horror supposed to scare people on a direct sort of
level? Cyberpunk isn't "scary" except in a very abstract, intellectual
level... and that *only* because the world it presents seems fairly
plausible. What's more, the interest of people in it is *not* dependent on
their being scared by it... unlike horror.

>In other words, the distinction is only "clear" if you can prove, beyond the
>shadow of a doubt that cyberpunk is NOT horror.  In a directed forum for 
>discussion, the preponderance of proof does not lie upon those who maintain
>that a particular topic or vein is appropriate, but rather upon those who
>maintain that it is inappropriate.

   ... It seems like an absurd proposition to me. I mean, it's like putting
together, say, Raymond Feist's Faerie Tale together with William Gibson.

>(This is to distinguish a "directed forum" from a "determined forum", in 
>which the preponderance of proof IS upon those who maintain that a topic
>is valid for discussion.  Whether one wishes to admit it or not, USEnet
>newsgroups which are not moderated are directed forums, not determined
>forums.  I will grant that moderated groups can be determined forums.)

   No argument here.

>In any case, I would consider "Dark Conspiracy" to fit as validly within
>"cyberpunk" as anywhere else--unless someone has decided to violate the
>very spirit of cyberpunk and set down hard and fast laws defining it.

   Okay, we'll try another tack. Dark Conspiracy has a heroic bias to it.
It is not nihilistic in the way that a punk attitude requires. IE: The
players are expected to do things for the common good, not just helping
themselves... which is one of the things that characterizes cyberpunk.

   Hm. This is beginning to sound like a topic for alt.cyberpunk...

         Loki         | cs341a002@husky1.stmarys.ca | Brynjolfr Myrkjartanarson
 often sysop of TWWOL | cs341a002@stmarys.bitnet    |    Compaignie Mercurie

Those who teach authenticity accomplish more than those who preach it.

                --- Morgan Wolfsinger
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc