Many gamers have found that the buzz surrounding the Matrix 4 trailer has rekindled their appetite for games with a cyberpunk setting, of which there are a great many. Cyberpunk-themed games are almost as old as the cyberpunk genre itself and are showing no signs of waning in popularity.The original Matrix trilogy spawned three video game spin-offs of its own, of course, but there are a great many other cyberpunk IPs with excellent games in their portfolios. So, until The Matrix 4 finally uploads into movie theatres on December 22, gamers will have plenty of interactive cyberpunk fodder to keep them entertained.
10 Mirror’s Edge Catalyst
Mirror’s Edge is the very definition of a cult hit. Almost everyone who played it loved its ultra-immersive sci-fi parkour but, given that it was from the developer and publisher behind the Battlefield series, it didn’t sell particularly well.
EA and DICE even gave it a second chance with the reboot, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst, but sales were once again poor. Still, for anyone who wants a unique gameplay experience combined with a uniquely clean, bright take on cyberpunk aesthetics, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst comes highly recommended.
9 Ghostrunner
Ghostrunner appears to be the result of someone at developer One More Level playing Mirror’s Edge and thinking, “What this game needs is… a sword!” Throw a bit of Titanfall’s wall-running into the mix, and you have a recipe for an extremely fast-paced, intense, hardcore first-person hack ‘n’ slash platformer.
And the story and setting are pure cyberpunk, to the degree that playing Ghostrunner can become a game of “spot the cyberpunk cliche/reference”. Or at least it would if the player didn’t have to concentrate so hard on not dying every three seconds.
8 Superhot
During Superhot’s opening sequence – which is delivered through an MS-DOS-style chat client – the player-character’s friend says that the game is “too hard to describe. just play it.” And it’s true, it is very hard to describe.
Superhot’s unique selling point is that it’s an FPS where time only moves when the player does but, of course, that doesn’t really mean anything to anyone who hasn’t played it. Suffice to say it’s innovative, surprising, and almost disturbingly satisfying to play. The cyberpunk theme was probably born of indie-budget necessity, but the clever metanarrative makes it feel like a deliberate choice.
7 Cyberpunk RED
Cyberpunk RED is the fourth edition (released in 2019 to coincide with the release of Cyberpunk 2077) of Cyberpunk, the tabletop role-playing game that inspired CD Projekt’s ambitious action RPG.
The earlier editions of the game, the first of which came out in 1988, were criticized for feeling sloppy and rushed, but there was something about the cyberpunk setting that tabletop gamers found irresistible, and Cyberpunk emerged as something of a cult hit. The RED edition rulebook is worth owning for the fantastic artwork alone, but the rules have been streamlined and tidied up too.
6 Saints Row 4
Saints Row 4 is one gigantic spoof not just of cyberpunk, but of all sci-fi. Cyberpunk does seem to be a particular target of its jokes though. It has a content pack called Enter The Dominatrix, after all.
The main setting for the game is a VR simulation of the city of Steelport, which is a very cyberpunk start. And the most important new character is Kinzie who, at first glance, appears to be a very typical “hacker girl”, but ultimately proves to have more than a few butt-kickings tricks up the sleeves of her oversized hoodie.
5 Watch Dogs 2
While the first Watch Dogs was technically a cyberpunk game – the main character is a hacker, and the game logo has an underscore in it – it ultimately didn’t really do very much with its cyberpunk theme. Underneath it all, it was just another GTA-ish open-world game, albeit a pretty decent one.
That all changed in Watch Dogs 2 which, as well as adopting a much lighter, more humorous tone, brought hacking and gadgetry to the forefront of gameplay. This change made for a much better game that really helped distinguish the Watch Dogs series from the open-world pack.
4 Deus Ex
The granddaddy of all cyberpunk games, it’s difficult to express just how groundbreaking Deus Ex was when it came out over two decades ago. It blended first-person shooting with role-playing and player choice in ways that had never been seen before and picked up pretty much every Game Of The Year award going.
Deus Ex was no Matrix copycat, having been initially conceived way back in 1993, but it must certainly have benefitted from the cyberpunk boom triggered by the Wachowskis masterwork. It spawned several successful sequels, but none had anything like the impact of the original game.
3 Watch Dogs: Legion
Watch Dogs: Legion’s “play as anyone” mechanic is a brilliant idea. In the “near future” London, everyone is so unhappy with life in the city that absolutely all of them can be recruited to the DeadSec resistance movement. Once recruited, the player can then choose to play the game as them. Ubisoft’s best guess as to how many procedurally generated recruits there are in the game is a staggering 9 million.
Some critics felt that the dev team should have channeled more time and resources into the rest of the game, but even the harshest nay-sayers have to admit that the “play as anyone” concept has a lot of potential for future games in the series.
2 Detroit: Become Human
Some might argue that Quantic Dream’s interactive sci-fi thriller isn’t cyberpunk because it’s not dark and rainy all the time, and there are no hackers with pseudo-cool nicknames in it. But it clearly has a lot in common with Blade Runner, and there’s nothing more cyberpunk than Blade Runner.
The theme of the ethical (or not) treatment of sentient machines is perfect fodder for Quantic Dream’s decision-based gameplay and branching plots. Critics were divided on the game’s merits on its release, but it’s gone on to sell over 6 million copies, so players have really lapped it up.
1 Cyberpunk 2077
Despite launching in a disappointingly unpolished state, Cyberpunk 2077 is a must-play for fans of rain, neon, and hi-tech lowlifes. There are a lot of issues to be forgiven, although fewer of them now that the game has been patched, but it’s still a hugely ambitious, impressive, and immersive game on many levels.
Also, Keanu Reeves is in it, and no one is more guaranteed to give Matrix fans warm, fuzzy feelings while they wait for their most-anticipated movie in many years than Neo himself.