Why is/was Shadowrun more popular than Cyberpunk?

[MGibster]

So, would you say Cyberpunk is bigger today? More people trying the TTRPG since the game and anime came out...

Having a big Netflix show and a popular video game means the Cyberpunk brand is probably doing better as a whole right now. Does that translate to the TTRPG though? There's certainly more interst in Cyberpunk then we've seen in years, they're even coming out with a 2077 supplment, but I don't know if this is just a flash-in-the pan or if it'll last a few years. My suspicion is that it won't last long because Red isn't a very good game. But then I think Shadowrun is nigh unplayable and they keep churning out books.

 

[Celebrim]

Fantasy is always more popular than science fiction. Indeed, I struggle to think of a single example of popular and widely successful science fiction.

 

[MacDhomnuill]

I've been racking my brains trying to think of any RPGs that don't have some form of magic or fantastical technologies that might as well be magic. Twilight 2000 and Delta Force: America Strikes Back! are the most mundane settings I can think of as as there's no magic or super science in either of them. I still think part of Shadowrun's success compared to Cyberpunk are due to some of the factors I mentioned, but at the end of the day I think you're right. A mundane hi-tech world just isn't as broadly appealing as fantasy. There's something about fantasy that makes it easy for people to dive into.

Delta Force takes me all the way back to high school, I was trying to explain it to a couple of the younger generation and they could not understand why you would want to roleplay that. All I could say waw "Chuck Norris on a rocket launching Moto cross bike".

 

[MGibster]

Delta Force takes me all the way back to high school, I was trying to explain it to a couple of the younger generation and they could not understand why you would want to roleplay that. All I could say waw "Chuck Norris on a rocket launching Moto cross bike".

I tried to get a friend of mine to run the game and add zombies to it. This was back around 1988-1989. We could have been ahead of the curve on zombie gaming, but no, Chris, you said it was stupid! Whose stupid now, Chris?

 

[Hand of Evil]

This may be the first time history anyone suggested Shadowrun 1E had better rules than any other game.

Did not say Shadowrun had better rules, said that Cyberpunk's rules did not lend themselves to the world.

 

[Thomas Shey]

All I know is that my 15 year old brain was too small to figure out the damage system.

It wasn't a common approach at the time, but it wasn't unique.

 

[Thomas Shey]

There's Boot Hill as well. Did Bushido have magic or was it pretty much a historical setting?

Boot Hill was the earliest of the Western games I referred to. Bushido had plenty of magic. It was fantasy old Nippon basically.

 

[Campbell]

Shadowrun is basically reskinned D&D. It has a somewhat familiar playstyle and set of tropes well-suited to players/GMs who have experience with the world's most popular roleplaying game. As a game line it also had a lot of adventure support and lacked the lethality of Cyberpunk 2020 which could be quite brutal if run in the way most role players are used to running games.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

There's Boot Hill as well. Did Bushido have magic or was it pretty much a historical setting?


Behold the might of FASA marketing!

I loved that video in 1991 or whenever it came out. We actually larped Shadowrun in like... 1992 or something? I'm sure the folks at the cafe were nonplussed by my Orc Rigger look and my buddy's huge yellow wig as an Elf Decker. Glad/Sad I don't have pictures of that game...

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Per the OP, it could be that whoever owns the license of SR is not as aggressively pursuing it getting into larger mainstream media compared to the Pondsmiths. I mean, Cyberpunk Edgerunners did ok on Netflix?