Carlos Lizarraga has a great appreciation for old-school cyberpunk. The title of his forthcoming retro-FPS shooter, Sprawl, is a nod to the famous trilogy of books penned by William Gibson that are widely credited for establishing the genre. While cyberpunk's popularity has exploded with the release of high-budget blockbusters like Cyberpunk 2077 and indie hits like The Ascent, Lizarraga is not content to retread familiar chrome and neon-soaked visions of the future.
Lizarraga spoke with Game Rant about the potential range and possibilities the genre represents, and how Sprawl hopes to expand those horizons. Even though the game itself is an homage to a specific time period - a retro first-person-shooter inspired by the twitchy, frantic titles of the late 90s and early 2000s - he believes Sprawl's sound and setting bring something authentically new to the table.
The Retrofuture Re-Imagined
A good cyberpunk title does not need to imitate Neuromancer or Blade Runner to succeed, according to Lizarraga. Even though he said he reveres that source material, and that its influences laid a powerful, evocative foundation for future works in the genre, cyberpunk has maintained a relatively stable aesthetic for half a century.
"It’s been 50 years since the picture of the retrofuture was painted. So where else can we take it? The neon color palette isn’t reflective of what the future is going to look like. At least I don’t think so. It’s gonna be more somber. We’re gonna destroy the world. What will that look like?"
Originally written in the late 1980s, Gibson's vision of the future, famously described as "high tech and low life," was painted by speculative visions of what the nascent Internet would become, informed by Cold War tensions, and the heavily synthesized soundtracks from films in that era. Apart from a few notable additions, like Ghost in the Shell and The Matrix, the look and feel of the genre has largely remained a time capsule for that anachronistic vision of the future.
Lizarraga hopes to explore alternative looks at what a cyberpunk-inspired future could look like, drawing influences from grounded, real-world locales such as the now-demolished Kowloon Walled City, and the streets of Hong Kong. Issues like environmental collapse, and more modern visions of the Internet further inform the look and feel of this new, cybernetic future. Lizarraga promises that what has been revealed of the game so far is just the tip of the iceberg. The title goes "off the rails" in its later levels, presenting players with environments unlike anything they have encountered to date in a cyberpunk title.
A Sound Beyond Synthwave
Regardless of how pronounced a game's visual style is, graphics only define one dimension of its aesthetic. Lizarraga's skills include playing and composing music in addition to designing and developing Sprawl, and he hopes to use the title as a platform to introduce a new acoustic palette to the genre.
"It is a hodgepodge of influences. And again, the reason goes back to that picture of the retrofuture. The soundtrack for every cyberpunk game still sounds like Perturbator or 80s synthwave, and it’s like, ‘Why are we still stuck here?’"
Lizarraga was quick to clarify he appreciates both synthwave and Perturbator, but he wants to see (and hear) something new. Touching on the distinctions between eastern and western cyberpunk, it seems like the sound of Sprawl will liberally borrow elements from films like Akira and Ghost in the Shell - the latter being Lizarraga's favorite piece of cyberpunk media. Again, he is wary of derivation, and aiming to create a soundscape like nothing players have encountered yet.
These eastern influences are evident in the game's trailers on Steam. They also tease core elements of Lizarraga's sonic vision for Sprawl's dystopian future. Compared to Cyberpunk 2077, Sprawl has more organic and human elements, including chants and tribal drums, with a mix of distortions and powerful, electronic sounds to unify tracks.
Forging A Distinct Identity
Striking a balance between homage and innovation is always a challenge, especially when creating period pieces, or variations thereof. Sprawl's gunplay, and highly exploitable movement system draws heavily from early 2000 Source engine titles; themselves something of a time-capsule, distorted through the lens of modern game design insights like the importance of vertical level design, and making every gun in the arsenal count.
It will be interesting to see how Sprawl merges these influences from the past with Lizarraga's forward-thinking hopes for the future of the cyberpunk genre.
Sprawl is currently in development for PC. A release date has yet to be announced.