Ghost in the Shell
Equally as well-known as Blade Runner to those familiar with the cyberpunk film genre is Ghost in the Shell, the 1995 anime movie based on the manga series which debuted in the late 1980s.
The story takes place in Tokyo 2029 and follows a cyborg public-security agent who hunts a mysterious hacker known as the Puppet Master. It’s a plot that features many themes quintessential to the genre, including transhumanism, augmentation, corporate warfare, and philosophical questions about self-identity in a technologically advanced world.
These are themes you’ll encounter throughout CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077, and indeed, Ghost in the Shell would almost certainly serve as a strong inspiration and point of reference during the game’s development.
The anime was later remade as a live-action film that released in 2017 starring Scarlett Johansen, which is perhaps better known in the mainstream but certainly isn’t the best version.
If you can, watch the anime, which does a far better job of portraying the “high tech, low life” aesthetic so important to any cyberpunk production.
