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[Twinwolf]

Gaming Block.

[Parsely]

KJ wants me to make a "cyberpunk restaurant management game." Not sure where to start.

[Andres]

That game idea sounds boring. Either that or it'll stop at/by page 6.

[Parsely]

That game idea sounds boring. Either that or it'll stop at/by page 6.

Your face is boring! (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻

Now it's "cyberpunk pirate dive bar management game."

[IronyOwl]

KJ wants me to make a "cyberpunk restaurant management game." Not sure where to start.

Step 1: Make him regret those words. Normally I'd suggest holographic catgirls, but I think he's big in those magical girl RP megathreads. Maybe... take "cyberpunk" in a brand new direction: British Explorers! On safari for techwolves, because he likes wolves.

Step 2: Flesh out the idea a little. Alright, so it's cyberpunk, but with British Explorers hunting Techwolves rather than... you know, pink-mohawked anti-establishment cyborg hackers or whatever. They can also be those too, of course, or you could start getting into semantics about just what does and does not make cyberpunk cyberpunk.

Going with the more traditional approach, the Wheel of Culture has spun again, leather and tattoos are now the domain of boring old people, and proper British or British-In-Spirit chaps intend to fully stick it to the man by hunting their vaunted Techwolves throughout a dystopian metropolis. "Stop doing that, you jerks," The Man keeps saying, "I need those techwolves to steal corporate secrets, instill fear and dependence in the local populace, and stop us all from being murdered by terrifying things lurking in the dark you all assumed were more of my lies and false flag schemes." Well screw you! Because we're going to keep hunting Techwolves like jolly ol' chaps.

Step 3: Figure out the angle. Assuming we want to keep this a restaurant management game and not a safari game, that makes players the outpost matrons or whatever you'd call them. Proper gentlemen come in, have a pint and bite to eat, and then leave to go hack terminals searching for the location and weak point of a particular beast of interest. It's your job to make sure they continue to do the first part, as that's what makes you money.

From there, I'd lean towards specific archetypes of customers, each with their own tastes and requirements, to give players flexibility and decisionmaking as to who and how they cater. As conditions shift here and there, with varying prey and danger types, political affiliations and fashion trends waxing and waning in different regions, you'll have to make decisions about whether you want to stick to your guns and let this blow over, or start shifting your menu and decorations to woo the new people most likely to be around. Random, more specific events could provide opportunities, and you could maybe send your staff on or hire some of your customers to exploit these possibilities.

Step 4: Pitch the idea to yourself to make sure you like it. So far we've got a restaurant, probably infested with decorations and stocked with some items but not others. Your staff may have RPG stats that can be improved by sending them on missions, but of course you can't cook much if you send off your only cook and oh he might get shot or arrested or something, either of which can probably be solved with enough money. Meanwhile, your cash inflow is based on how well your current setup matches the tastes of the crowds in and around your location on the city map, and these tastes fluctuate, forcing you to adapt in some cases, make decisions of preference in others, and gamble in still others. Presumably the state of your clientele also affects your chances of being raided, generously bribed, hit by rival gangs, catching on fire for completely unavoidable reasons we swear, getting mercenary offers, and so on.

Sounds solid to me! Relatively.

Step 5: I dunno throw numbers at it or something.

That game idea sounds boring. Either that or it'll stop at/by page 6.

Your face is boring! (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻

Now it's "cyberpunk pirate dive bar management game."

Well I think Andres tends to be serious business, so holographic catgirl lapdances are probably back on the table. Literally! Haha, because... anyway, you want the fruit hat or the giant parrot mask? You can't go back out there without a solid hat, you know.

[Andres]

I'm saying it sounds boring because it's a bar/inn/tavern management game. Those games have been tried before and they failed.

Cyberpunk is also a rather tricky thing to do. Games set in the future have their stories with high levels of technology, but cyberpunk games' stories are the high levels of technology. Going in depth about the ethical dilemmas of replacing real catgirl strippers with holographic catgirl strippers is rather tricky. Unless you're really good at philosophy, RP, and worldbuilding, it's gonna be boring.

EDIT: Or you can take IronyOwl's version of cyberpunk and just add "tech" before every word, but that's cheesy as shit and only barely better than steampunk.

[Harry Baldman]

Cyberpunk isn't really that tricky. It's science fiction that focuses on the underclass, with a notable amount of class warfare in the backstory (the rich rising to sovereignty, corporations controlling all aspects of civilian life, that kind of thing). But what IronyOwl has gotten right is that you do have a say on what that underclass might actually be. The run-of-the-mill punks of cyberpunk are expected, but perhaps not unique enough to inspire someone.

You could draw inspiration from various places in the globe - like zef in South Africa, La Sape in the Republic of Congo (which'd wind up looking similar to IronyOwl's concept), hip-hop culture or even rednecks relocated to an urban setting (the country is taken over by farming conglomerates, and they are bought out and forced to relocate into dystopian metropolises). All of these would actually carry more authenticity than the somewhat zeerusty depictions of punks in future dystopian cities.

A restaurant management game, then, would involve a restaurant for the underclass, or a restaurant manned by the underclass and catering to a higher-class clientele. In the former case the clientele is up to no good and you must facilitate their business while, say, ensuring their continued anonymity and avoiding police raids. In the latter case the staff are up to no good, and balance their jobs with a variety of criminal activities, because they might literally be paid pennies plus tips, and "tips" would often equate to screwing over some other people coming in to eat, because the only thing the rich hate more than the poor is other rich people, and the poor are sufficiently expendable and easy to hire against them.

Thinking about it, I think the one that requires the staff to take more active roles might work better. Against a background of general drudgery a crew of food processor operators, waiters, busboys, gladiators (if you want to have some dinner theater in there as well) and other such people, all probably dressed rather fancifully for the wealthy clientele's amusement, have to do various shady things to ensure their continued livelihood.

[Draignean]

I'm saying it sounds boring because it's a bar/inn/tavern management game. Those games have been tried before and they failed.

Lord knows we shouldn't do something if someone, somewhere, has already failed at it once. That would be disastrous!

More seriously, cyberpunk is a setting where your moral explorations of the background material should be more subtle. Neuromancer, one of the most (if not the single most) seminal books in the cyberpunk genre, follows a main character whose moral compass was sold at a pawn-shop last year so he could buy more amphetamines. He doesn't, as I recall, do a lot of philosophical musing. He'd probably bemoan the lack of physical breasts on a holographic cat-girl, but he'd appreciate the reduced rates. Hell, he might not even get that philosophical. Neuromancer raises questions because of the way it tells the story, but most cyberpunk protagonists are the kind of people that would shrug and answer that they "just live here" when confronted by the horrifying, soul crushing, all devouring world of consumption they live in. Cyberpunk is fairly similar to old west settings; it's about getting by in a world that doesn't give a damn whether you live or die.

Thinking about it, I think the one that requires the staff to take more active roles might work better. Against a background of general drudgery a crew of food processor operators, waiters, busboys, gladiators (if you want to have some dinner theater in there as well) and other such people, all probably dressed rather fancifully for the wealthy clientele's amusement, have to do various shady things to ensure their continued livelihood.

I actually really like the idea of a Cyberpunk tea-house. A staff of employees that are one step more cultured than street meat, providing drinks that cost more than a week's pay, and serving clientele that don't care half as much about the tea as they do about gossip and deals.

You could take IO's idea of décor shifting and mix it in to change the type of clientele you get. A green fan of feathers over a porcelain doll? A signal you might be able to contract high-class escorts here. A single red feather mixed in with the green? A message that the escorts might be available for... other purposes. A pair of Fu Dog statues by the entrance? Bodyguards are available for hire. A holographic spire in the middle of the room that constantly cascades the glyphs of the O'dno Jing? Discrete ICE breakers are on contract.

The players would be the staff members that have additional roles (Courtesans, Deckers, Bodyguards, Assassins, Spies, Saboteurs, Drug dealers, etc), and it might work best if they were independent contractors. This prevents the manager from monopolizing play, and it forces the players to juggle their contracts, their street reputation, and the good will of the tea house.

[piecewise]

KJ wants me to make a "cyberpunk restaurant management game." Not sure where to start.

Step one: Realize you're not really the first to do something like that and take inspiration from what came before: http://kiririn51.itch.io/valhalla-bar

Step two: Figure out what the hell players are gonna be doing. This is gonna be the hard part because it's difficult to make customer service an interesting thing to do for any period of time. I suggest using it as a framework for some other kind of things that players can do. Recettear still had you fight through dungeons, it wasn't all just sitting around in the shop, haggling. You can make the restaurant a front for some sort of rebellious scriptkiddies or mob drug house or cyper espionage outfit and let the players manage those things as well as working the shop to keep their cover. OR if you really want to keep them in the shop, make sure there is a big world outside that shop and that it is constantly smashing in with new opportunities, struggles and interesting scenarios for the players to handle.  No one wants to play or GM a game about getting some asshole with a purple mohawk and spandex bodysuit a very specific coffee order. At least not for long.

Step Three: Remember, cyberpunk has a particular look to it in most places, but it's the feel that really defines it. Cyberpunk is all about a specific set of fears about our current first world zeitgeist, and is the logical end to those fears, satire through exaggeration.

1.Corporations have too much power.
Everything is privatized, everything is for profit, everything is in the hands of vast, careless, superpowerful organizations that care about profit for more then they care about human life or dignity. Government is either replaced by them, or puppeted by them. The laws are in service of making money for choice few, while the majority of people are at best, living semi-comfortable lives as mindless consumers, and at worst, rotting in a shanty town that is continuously shot up by the cyber police for the crime of not buying enough designer blue jeans.

2.There is a massive disparity in wealth.
The middle class is basically gone, replaced by a stratified working poor. You know those areas in china were one guy owns a factory and he's super rich, while everyone else lives in giant, dense housing projects or tiny apartments? It's that, but everywhere. It might not be immediately obvious with all the high tech goodies everywhere, but that holocube or pleasure-net helmet exist in much the same way that TV does today; even a poor man can save up and get himself a flatscreen, though the irony of it will be lost on him.  Remember, that generally Cyberpunk heroes are not from wealthy backgrounds and are often quite poor. Hiro from snowcrash lived in a shipping container if I remember right.

3. Technology is a yoke used by the powerful to enslave the masses or fight amongst themselves.
Corporations create and control the best tech. They use technology to distract workers into not rebelling against the horrible conditions they live in. They use it to empower private security to fight against rebellion, they use it to arm corporate spies, they use it to benefit themselves. Those guys in shadowrun are always using illegal stuff meant for the army and private security right? They're not giving high tech medical treatment out to Anyone who doesn't own a yacht right?

4. Morality of Technology
A generalized thing relating to the morality or philosophy of the use of technology. Usually relates to things like cloning, the internet, AI, and the like. But could honestly relate to just about anything that causes moral conflict in terms of the use of technology. Hell, you could do this with cavemen. Fire clearly comes from the gods, but people are using it to do mundane and profane things like cook meat or warm their feet. It all depends on the morality and beliefs of the culture in question.

This is why all cyberpunk heroes are scrappy  punks with Mohawks, dyed hair, and lip rings. Cyberpunk is about capitalism, technology and conformity run amok, so the protagonists are gonna be people who embody the antithesis of that. So long as you stick to those major ideas, you can have literally any aesthetic and it will still be cyberpunk at heart. Hell, you could do Victorian-style cyberpunk, where the east india company has inserted a clockwork replica of the queen into power and they're now patrolling London in giant zeppelins while steam-powerarmored soldiers subjugate the working class and the distant jungles of darkest Africa with equal disregard for human life. I think there's a name for something like that....if only there were some convenient "Punk" permutation name to let me remember it!

Or if you've got really big balls, do prehistoric or Sumerian Cyberpunk.

[FallacyofUrist]

Running three games at once is probably my maximum, so I decided to put my latest idea here.

Time-Wound. Whence the players all have a unique time-manipulation power that must be used according to the Three Laws of Time to avoid and defeat the Enemy, and hopefully not break Time to the point of a [REDACTED].

[Parsely]

KJ wants me to make a "cyberpunk restaurant management game." Not sure where to start.

Step one: Realize you're not really the first to do something like that and take inspiration from what came before: http://kiririn51.itch.io/valhalla-bar

Valhalla was less a management game and more a drink mixing minigame + dialogue trees.

I think there's a name for something like that....if only there were some convenient "Punk" permutation name to let me remember it!

You'll think of something, skelepal!

Irony, Draig, Piece, Harry. I lub you guys. <3 Danke for ze dissertations. You guys are super useful.

[Digital Hellhound]

I can't believe a one-line description of an idea led to this much interesting discussion about what cyberpunk is. I like you people.

[piecewise]

Hey, whats a good Magical girl virtue that connotes defensiveness or perseverance or protectiveness of self or others? I'd use "Love" but thats what I'm using as the skill for tearing off limbs and fusing them to your body.

Thinking purity, maybe?

[Execute/Dumbo.exe]

Hey, whats a good Magical girl virtue that connotes defensiveness or perseverance or protectiveness of self or others? I'd use "Love" but thats what I'm using as the skill for tearing off limbs and fusing them to your body.

Thinking purity, maybe?

Innocence?

[Hawk132]

Heart?