The Top Five Cyberpunk Games

Though cyberpunk is probably on its way out, there's still a great selection of games in the genre -- most of them over a decade old. Here are the best cyberpunk games ever made.

5. Syndicate (PC, SNES)

Usually, cyberpunk's protagonists are people who suffer at the hands of corporations; the corporations themselves rarely receive much focus. But in Syndicate you play the role of an executive at a multinational business and must command a team of agents in missions to rub out the competition. It brings to life an interesting facet of the cyberpunk world.

The action takes place from a top-down isometrical view, usually in an urban environment, and your missions usually involve either killing a target or capturing an object. You're told not to kill civilians excessively, but as you might expect, there is no penalty even for wiping out the map's entire population.

Syndicate introduced a lot of interesting concepts, most notably the Persuadertron, a device that brainwashes anyone within its short radius. When enough civilians are brainwashed, you can start brainwashing armed police, and with enough police you can even brainwash enemy agents, who then join your ranks. It made a less violent approach feasible, if not very easy.

4. Decker (PC)

A fantastic hacking simulation, Decker is based on the cyberspace rules from the pen-and-paper RPG Shadowrun. The premise is a familiar one: You're an underequipped, underfunded hacker. You take contracts that require different objectives to be completed, and if you're successful, you might get enough cash to pay the rent. Extra cash can be spent on hardware, software and utilities like chip burners, while extra time can be used for programming and firmware burning.