Can Buck Rogers be Cyberpunk?

[WittyDroog]

Not quite sure how one would go about this, but I'd love to see someone try.

I guess you would have to grim'n'dark up that kind of a setting, also things like raging against the machine and computer hacking might be different. Perhaps something involving ham radios (since it's Buck Rogers, afterall). I'd love to see some rule such as that found in Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon in which someone can simply roll down their window to shoot at a space ship with their pistol and no space suit whatsoever.



Just a thought.

[Spacemouse]

What an interesting idea. My first thought was that the easiest way to do this would be to feature a Buck Rogers-like VR world within a CP setting - maybe as a photorealistic MMORPG or the like. That way, the characters and their world might be pure pulp, but the people playing them would have dark-future sensibilities. If done right, the end result could be an unsettling combination of pulp glamour and cyberpunk nihilism.

Well okay, I lied. The above was my second thought. The first one was, where does one get an idea like that?! 8P

[WittyDroog]

Hmmm a virtual Buck Rogers, complete with classic problems with a virtual world ("Oh no, Nazis have taken over the ship!" classic Trek trope).

Could be a hoot.

[Chainsaw Aardvark]

. A storyline from the comic Gunnerkrigg Court,, which in itself is kind of urban/magi-tech punk setting, and then add in a holo-deck style simulation spoofing 30's pulp SF.

For a while I've wanted to run a deliberately retro sort of SF with punch-card computers and art deco styling. Also co-existence with vampires (blood available at drive in restaurants as a beverage choice) and dynamaxian cars. Take visuals straight from the original 1929 Metropolis (possibly the true origin of cyberpunk) and those two mile high skyscrapers with atomic powered elevators for Frank Loyd Wright.

[SheikhJahbooty]

It's good to know I'm not the only one spending too much time on Paleo-future.

I have no idea how to do Buck Rogers without a two fisted hero.

I have no idea how to do cyberpunk with a two fisted hero. I always picture cyberpunk heroes as people that would rather not be saving the world, but they're stuck with this crappy job.

Other than that, the Buster Crabbe version of Buck Rogers did have megacities ruled by organized crime syndicates, and dissidents were forced into obedience with mind numbing helmets. I think that mafia and yakuza and whatnot were out in the open and mainstream in Neil Stephanson's Snow Crash. And a slave cap would be very cyberpunk, just a hat that prevents signals from getting in or out of one's frontal lobe.

[Kinslayer]

I always thought of Buck Rogers as a prime example of how post-post apocalyptic settings differed from regular post-apoc. Cyberpunk could be seen as riding out the apocalypse in a chrome coffin instead.