This is a guide including a comprehensive list of Cyberpunk related games I want people to know about


I like collections, and organized lists of things I like, it makes me happy to dote upon games and shows I enjoy. I figure, as long as I make lists like these, I may as well make them public so others can see what I'm up to. Whatever's here is solely my opinion, not every game is perfect, nor permanent. But I try my best to include what I enjoy and think others would as well.

Cyberpunk is a sub-genre of Science Fiction that has debatable origins, but generally it's recognized as the combination of complex cybernetic technology with society in the midst of low quality of life.

High Tech, Low Life

Cyberpunk often dabbles in invasive technology, corporate scheming that drowns out society for the worse, a near future dystopia concerning the freedoms of humanity to the power of corporate or government reign. With it you find cultural shifts in sexual revolution, dazzling new fashion styles, bright neon lights shining in dark desolate landscapes, mass extinction in animal and plant life, morally dubious robotics and artificial intelligence and powerful cybernetic technology.

I love Cyberpunk, it's my passion.

Cyberpunk 2077 was the 2020 release open world RPG produced by CD Projekt Red

In 1988 Mike Pondsmith began the Cyberpunk franchise aptly named after the genre it takes after, it wasn't until 2020 that a full fledged videogame was produced with the IP, but the lore and world surrounding Cyberpunk 2077 has been built and curated for decades.

When Cyberpunk 2077 launched in 2020 after numerous delays, it was a full fledged disaster. The game was riddled with bugs, graphical issues, false promises and it lacked the capability to function on a portion of the consoles it released on. Since 2020, CD Projekt red worked Ruthlessly to rebuild the game, using the already concrete and well written story to keep faith with its community while they ironed out the less than perfect gameplay. As of 2024, the game sits with positive reviews and a strong community.

Sitting with tens of hours of possible first person gameplay as well as a highly regarded expansion, Cyberpunk 2077 encapsulates everything the genre seeks to express. Multiple story routes with different styles of clothing, literature and weaponry scattered throughout an awesome open world map, the game even includes a one hundred and fifty song soundtrack almost entirely made originally for the game. Including big names like Grimes or Refused making popular tracks, or small up and coming artists being featured on the different in game radio stations, including a station exclusively made up of community made songs.

As far as gameplay goes, the game is almost entirely done in third person, apart from very few end game cutscenes. The gunplay is fairly generic, mostly spiced up with unique "special" weapons you can find in quests or looted throughout the map. However, the games combat can be made unique to each save with different unlockable abilities in each individual skill trees, as well as installable cybernetics with unique powers, such as extendable arm blades, whips, or the ability to slow down time entirely.



The real shining piece of Cyberpunk 2077 is caught in the story for the game. With the expansion, the game has 7 unique endings. With tons of interactive characters and relationships you'll build throughout the game, four romantic or platonic partners with their entire own story and questlines.
The game has an abundance of dialogue options with full story dependant decisions. Dialogue options locked to your own playstyle and skill trees, as well as with your chosen background.

Cyberpunk 2077 is what comes to mind for a lot of people when you mention the Cyberpunk genre's games. And for good reasons besides the namesake. If you have an itch for the genre, or just want to get into it for the first time, Cyberpunk 2077 is an easily approachable game, given the RPG styles popularity in gaming.




https://steamproxy.com/steamstore/app/1091500/Cyberpunk_2077/

VA-11 Hall-A: Cyberpunk Bartender Action was a 2016 released game by Sukeban Games


Being the first indie entry on this list, VA-11Hall-A is an absolutely beautiful Cyberpunk visual novel. Sporting simple pixel graphics and a relatively consistent bartending UI. You serve as a bartender who mixes drinks, and changes lives.

Being a visual novel, the gameplay throughout VA11HallA is relatively simple, as new and returning clients stumble into your small hole-in-the-wall bar, you serve a wide list of custom drinks to unlock each visitors unique story. Though you sparsely leave the bar, house or store, you take in the game's city and setting through witty, introspective and funny dialogue between clients and yourself.

Lacking the same rebellious gung-ho perspective of Cyberpunk 2077 or other cyberpunk media, VA11HallA is a far more casual approach to the genre, where you yourself aren't anything special given the characters you'll meet. Lilith robots who serve as superstars or specialty sex workers. Bulky cyber-augmented hitmen, or your mysterious well endowed hacker friend.



VA11HallA is a must-play for the genre, it has beautiful art, great writing, and an amazing soundtrack. Not to mention, pretty women. There's clear reason for the game's incredible Overwhelmingly Positive reviews.



https://steamproxy.com/steamstore/app/447530/VA11_HallA_Cyberpunk_Bartender_Action/

Katana Zero is a Neo Noir Platformer released in 2019 by Askiisoft

Beautifully Brutal, and violently majestic, Katana Zero is one of my, if not my absolute favorite games of all time. One of the highest rated games on steam with a diabolically low amount of sales relative to other games. It's a game like no other.

In a crime ridden run down neo noir city, you play as a drug fueled time bending soldier, who slices through more men in one night than most armies will kill in a battle. With stunning pixelated graphics and a difficulty that not everyone can master, Katana Zero is one of the most electric platformers you can get your hands on. Every level is suited with its own unique playstyle and killer soundtrack, with boss fights whose themes won't leave your head for months.

The gameplay is absolutely the highlight of Katana Zero. Given a brutally unforgiving one hit K.O System for both you, and your enemies. The ability to slow down time, roll between bullets, or deflect them right back at the shooter. The type of game where the only time you'll have a gun in your hands, is when you're throwing it back at your enemy.

Despite the game's focus on its gameplay, the story and writing are nothing to scoff at. Playing as a relatively small spoken protagonist, most dialogue had is with characters who you'll quickly end. Or your pesky psychiatrist. The writing throughout the game hits hard, whether its coming from a friend, or from the boss fight you're struggling to complete, it only serves to enhance the gameplay.



Katana Zero isn't a game most first time players would consider Cyberpunk, as it loosely follows the same general enemies and characters you'd find in games like Cyberpunk 2077, or movies like Bladerunner. What Katana Zero lacks in crazy looking Cyborgs and futuristic weaponry, it makes up for in heavy Cyberpunk themes and writing. It deals with a heavy loss of humanity, control over society by technologically induced government outreach. Neon lights in a crumbling metropolis, and a series of villains that blur the lines between Gang and Government.




https://steamproxy.com/steamstore/app/460950/Katana_ZERO/

The Red Strings Club is a 2018 Cyberpunk Noir game by Deconstructeam


Yet another pixel graphic indie game, The Red Strings Club, is classically Cyberpunk. Similarly to Va11Hall-A, You play as a bartender in a withering city (A Trope we can thank Cyberpunk's roots in Noir as a genre for).

The Red Strings Club doesn't serve to do anything new to the genre, it's Cyberpunk in every way shape and form it could be. Providing introspection, psychological debates and social commentary on the possibilities that lie in a technologically advanced dystopian future. Conversations about the ethics of advertising that you have with an AI fueled android. Or discussing how much human emotion can we take away before we turn into robots ourselves.

Being a bartending game, the gameplay in The Red Strings Club is simple, yet unique from similar games like Va11-Hall-A. In this game, you seek to tap into certain emotions in each special client that enters your bar, using 6 different liquors to navigate through a characters visualized soul. Manipulating or prodding characters to give vital information that you'll use to have your own effect on the city and its people. Each character is given their own theme, as well as in depth puzzles and goals that you'll discover throughout the game.



The only real flaw with The Red Strings Club, is how short the game ends up being, with a fairly linear playthrough, it's a story very short and sweet, but absolutely worth playing if you're invested in the genre. If story rich, psychological conversations is what you're after, this is the game for you.




https://steamproxy.com/steamstore/app/589780/The_Red_Strings_Club/