Utopia and Dystopia

Neuromancer, and by extension other cyberpunk works are set in densely populated urban cities. Due to the cramped conditions and lack of regulations and restrictions placed upon technologies and the corporations that sell them in these environments, the residents of these cities often live in poorly maintained and disused areas, or in coffin hotels, firmly identifying cyberpunk cities as dystopian in nature.  In order to develop the look and feel of the game environment I would be creating, I needed to clearly identify the difference between a utopian and dystopian city. In order to do this I created two moodboards, one depicting utopian cities, the other showing dystopian cities.

Utopian cities, although featuring closely-knit urban environments, subvert the claustrophobic nature of cities by featuring large spaces between similarly sized buildings and often feature parks or rivers in order to create a balance between nature and the city. Utopian cities also make use of bright cool colours blended with warm colours in order to show a bright, clean city.

Dystopian cities use the close-knit nature of urban environments in order to create a claustrophobic and unsettling atmosphere, by tightly packing in the buildings together, the human residents are made to feel incredibly small and cramped together, almost everything is artificial within these cities, giving the streets an unnatural, uneasy feel. Dystopian cities also make frequent use of dark, block colours in order to evoke emotions of fear and unease within the unsafe and unregulated city streets.

For my game environment I would need to make use of the dystopian city conventions, creating claustrophobic spaces and utilising dark colours in order to visually represent the poor living conditions of the city.