On Space And Cyberpunk (NULL_SPACE Devlog)

February 21, 2026

What is the intended vibe of NULL_SPACE?

“Cyberpunk-esque” #

Shannon at The Novel Gamemaster described NULL_SPACE on bluesky as having “a low-powered mothership feel but leaning towards more cyberpunk-esque rather than space horror”, and then I spent like twenty posts in a thread meandering on what I was trying to do with it. This is a paraphrase and extension of that thread.

I suppose cyberpunk-esque is not an incorrect description, really, but it wasn’t 100% my intent. So why does it feel cyberpunk-esque?

We Just Live There Now #

When going into writing NULL_SPACE, from the start, I was adamant about it not being 80s retrofuturistic. I didn’t want CRTs, switches, knobs, and levers. I wanted shitty touchscreens and computers that snitch on you and proprietary software that sucks because the corp went with the lowest bidder. Basically I wanted it to make something that feels like that kind of stuff might have felt in the 80s - like this is what we have now, just More and Worse.

And, well, a lot of things we have now that I’d extrapolate are kind of cyberpunk concepts, just not the cool ones like arm swords. A worrying number of things in everyday life are spying on you, corporations run rampant, everything’s always getting shittier. So if you’re extrapolating from now, that’s kind of where you end up.

SPACE! #

So why are we in space?

One thing I wanted to keep as a north star going into this was the famous observation (whoever you’d like to credit it to, in whatever form): It’s generally easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. My corollary is that things don’t tend to “end” dramatically. Rome didn’t fall overnight, it fell apart over centuries. (Not that I’d know anything about living in a decaying empire.) In my imagining of a shit future, space provides needed safety valves for the contradictions that build up around capitalist concepts infinite growth when there’s nowhere to grow.

So it continues on, just progressively worse. The frontier moves outward. The one place not corrupted by capitalism gets a big taste of the free market. And those less-than-fair planets and colonies where desperate workers are shoved into awful jobs and living conditions are where we set our scene.

Now let’s get back to cyberpunk.

Old vs New Ideas of Corporate Rule #

80s-style cyberpunk imagines corporations as basically being competent states. They have their own infrastructure, a unified, strong culture, leadership that’s evil but smart and in control, and so on. It’s basically the zaibatsu and/or keiretsu model, more or less, which makes sense given how weird everyone was about Japan back then.

Modern big companies don’t really play like that. Instead of being self-reliant, whenever they can, they sit on top of and drain public infrastructure. (You don’t really need to have armies of footsoldiers when you can just, y’know, get local cops to do your dirty work.) Any company of a certain size is a bureaucratic nightmare where every subdivision is pointing a gun (figuratively) at every other subdivision. Decisions flow from the top like proclamations of a mad emperor: nonsensical and likely to screw everything up, but do you want to be the one who says no?

This all leads to carelessness, sloppiness, wastefulness, and when something’s gotten the attention of upper leadership, gross overreaction.

Low Power, High Potential #

The vibe I wanted to bring is low power, high potential. Characters don’t really have any kind of superhuman ability and are pretty low on the totem pole, but they can do consequential things without necessarily being instantly screwed.

Filling in the Cracks #

Big, international companies are overextended as hell and fragmented into a million subdivisions that kick up to the top but act semi-independently until there’s a crisis. This fragmentation isn’t going to get particularly better when they become interplanetary instead. Those subdivisions will always be looking for freelancers because they’re short-handed; or their station is short-handed; or because their parent company gave them something impossible to do and they’re trying to make it happen anyway; or because the resources they do have wouldn’t be terribly willing to do it the way they want it done. (Or it’s just because you’re cheaper, more disposable, or more deniable than a “real” employee.) All kinds of people are desperate and companies won’t help them, even when they’re employees of said companies. Companies will often just cut them loose when they’re inconvenient!

When the powers that be are neglectful, various under-the-table services typically fill the void.

Retalitation #

So what happens when you act out against The Man?

1. Well, first, they have to find out. Unless it’s overt, it probably takes some time. Ideally you’re gone by then.
2. Let’s say they did figure out. How much does that local branch want to notify central corporate that they got punked? Probably not that much. They’ll try to stay local or at least quiet a lot of the time. They’ll likely go for local resources first - and maybe even hire some intrepid freelancers to go sniff the perpetrator out.
3. Now let’s say they do run home with their tail between their legs. How does central corporate management respond? Maybe slowly, but definitely strongly. Their incentive switches from “don’t let the suits know” to “now that the suits know, make it clear we’re dealing with it”.
4. A hard crackdown then leads to further ripples: beyond just potential backlash, if the company is pouring resources in to make an example of someone and it drags, what else is being neglected?

There’s a clear pattern of escalation here that provides ample fodder for a lot of different scenarios - not just for players but in fodder for how non-player characters interact with corporations to come up with jobs.

The goal was to paint this picture in the core book, but especially in various Jobs. (Of the four, 3/4 involve corporate neglect and 3/4 involve corporate retaliation. Two overlap.) As further supplements come out for the game, I’m hoping I can maintain that sense while characters live in that periphery.

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