History Main / CassetteFuturism

* ''Literature/LeftBehind'' of all things does this semi-unintentionally -- the last book in the series, ''Kingdom Come'', was written in 2007, is mostly set in 2093, and features fax machines and DVD players as cutting edge technology, simply due to the need to keep continuity with the earlier entries.

This aesthetic can be considered a retro version of {{Cyberpunk}}, and is largely inspired by cyberpunk writers from the 1980s and 1990s, such as Creator/WilliamGibson, Creator/NealStephenson, and Creator/RogerZelazny. It also draws inspiration from ''Cypher''punk, a movement promoting online anonymity and the use of advanced cryptography that originated in the late 1980s. As well, there is a link to MundaneDogmatic, an early 2000s niche sci-fi genre. In 2013, the designer and futurist Nick Foster was inspired by Mundane Science Fiction's philosophy, si he developed a philosophy for industrial design for futuristic media called "The Future Mundane". Among his proposals is the idea of depicting technology as an "accretive space", where advanced technologies and sophisticated gear is used alongside older devices.

This aesthetic can be considered a retro version of {{Cyberpunk}}, and is largely inspired by cyberpunk writers from the 1980s and 1990s, such as Creator/WilliamGibson, Creator/NealStephenson, and Creator/RogerZelazny. It also draws inspiration from ''Cypher''punk, a movement promoting online anonymity and the use of advanced cryptography that originated in the late 1980s.

-->-- '''WebVideo/MandaloreGaming''''s review of ''[[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/Duskers Duskers]]''

-->-- '''[[WebVideo/MandaloreGaming MandaloreGaming's]]''' review of ''[[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/Duskers Duskers]]''

* The original ''Anime/BubblegumCrisis'' is as '80s as it gets (thanks to, among other things, being a homage to ''Film/StreetsOfFire'') even if it happens in the 2030s. One example is that the "Data Units," (portable computer information storage units with hefty amounts of data on the KillerRobot Boomers and the Hardsuit PoweredArmor that are used via BrainUploading) which serve as an important MacGuffin in the backstory of two mayor characters, look like Betamax cassettes.

* The original ''Series/BattlestarGalactica1978'' is about as joyously 1970s-looking a space opera as anyone could ask for; or it was, until series creator Glen Larson took this trope [[ExaggeratedTrope even further]] with ''Series/BuckRogersInTheTwentyFifthCentury,'' listed below.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'', being a mishmash of all sorts of futures and settings, features this trope particularly in the Hive Cities, where 70s style punks that live in a {{Cyberpunk}} WretchedHive face off against each other or expies of JudgeDredd that make up the local police force. Other times, some technology of the Imperium Of Man is quite boxy and their screens tend to lack a Graphical User Interface. Considering that the game was developed in the 80s, a lot of the original [[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/warhammer40k/images/2/2d/Field_Police.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20111011185130 artwork was full of this trope.]]

This aesthetic can be considered a retro version of {{Cyberpunk}}, and is largely inspired by cyberpunk writers from the 1980s and 1990s, such as Creator/WilliamGibson, Creator/NealStephenson, and Creator/RogerZelazny. It also draws inspiration from Cypherpunk, a movement promoting online anonymity and the use of advanced cryptography that originated in the late 1980s.

* ''VideoGame/{{Signalis}}'' is set in a compound run by a quasi-Eastern Bloc-esque polity called the Nation of Eusan, which still relies on big, blocky CRT monitors, computers reliant on floppy discs, large and bulky radio transmitters that relies on cassettes, and screens that depicts vector monitors. All of this coinciding with propaganda posters that would fit quite well of its era whilst still having RidiculouslyHumanRobots.

* ''VideoGame/{{Control}}'' takes place inside a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture Brutalist]] building full of deliberately outmoded technology. The Federal Bureau of Control specifically forbids "anything smart" (including cell phones) from being brought into the Oldest House, and there are even posters warning employees of the Bureau to be on the lookout for modern technology because it does not react well to the supernatural phenomena within. The desktop computers are big and bulky in the style of an early '80s "micro" or IBM PC, mainframes are absolutely huge and covered in analog switches and blinkenlights, the Bureau uses reel-to-reels and film projectors, data is transferred between departments via an immense pneumatic tube system (even if it does lose things sometimes), and even the firearms used by agents and rangers are outdated. Nothing can be seen in use that dates back to later than the 1970s or '80s. One of the theories posited by the Bureau as to why only older tech works in the Oldest House is that the Oldest House runs on human cultural memory, and it hasn't caught up with modern technology yet. This is also why everything in the Bureau is labeled as a very generic BlandNameProduct, since specific name-brand products react... oddly with the Oldest House.

* ''VideoGame/{{Control}}'' takes place inside a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture Brutalist]] building full of deliberately outmoded technology. The Federal Bureau of Control specifically forbids "anything smart" (including cell phones) from being brought into the Oldest House, and there are even posters warning employees of the Bureau to be on the lookout for modern technology because it does not react well to the supernatural phenomena within. The desktop computers are big and bulky in the style of an early '80s "micro" or IBM PC, mainframes are absolutely huge and covered in analog switches and blinkenlights, the Bureau uses reel-to-reels and film projectors, data is transferred between departments via an immense pneumatic tube system (even if it does lose things sometimes), and even the firearms used by agents and rangers are outdated. Nothing can be seen in use that dates back to later than the 1970s or '80s.

->''"We’re deep in that magical Ridley Scott {{Film/Alien}} future. You can fly to a different solar system, but your PC won’t have a taskbar."''

A technological aesthetic reminiscent of mid-1970s to late 1990s tech (regardless of the real time setting of the media) as [[TropeCodifier codified]] by early microcomputers like the Altair 8800 and the UsefulNotes/IBMPersonalComputer, cold war era technology, the iconic imagery of the mid to late space race, or the post-Cold War "end of history" period in the 1990s, which was characterized by fascination with virtual reality technologies (such as helmets) and 2D computer animation.

As the name implies, a good way to judge if this trope is present is the frequent use of cassettes, which were used in the decades named above to house magnetic tape ubiquitous in technology of the period, and later on often contained ROM chips for game consoles and occasionally add-ons for computing hardware. Other technologies to look out for are boxy CRT displays, computer systems reminiscent of microcomputers like the UsefulNotes/Commodore64, freestanding hi-fi systems, small LCD or monochrome green CRT displays as opposed to full color screens, [[MagicFloppyDisk floppy disks]], reel to reel tape drives, VHS or Beta videotape, dot matrix printers, dial-up modems and loads of analog technologies. TheInternet or [[TheAlternet some analogue]] may exist, but if it's used more frequently than physical media to exchange large files, chances are that the work isn't using this trope. Optical CD disks may also be present, but no [=DVD=]s.

Expect many high-end electronics to come in beige box cases. When actually using the electronics or looking into the displays, expect that OurGraphicsWillSuckInTheFuture: there will be TwoDVisualsThreeDEffects and some employment of {{Retraux}} by virtue of having said 3D consist of very simple geometry with stock textures. Odd hybrid setups echoing the experimental era of user interfaces are also common: one might find rotary dials and switchboards alongside a more modern keyboard, a joystick used in place of a mouse on an low-resolution icon-based GUI, or basic LCD readouts and indicator light displays with cryptic labels seemingly included as afterthoughts acknowledging that the user might like to know [[BlackBox what, if anything, a device might be doing]].

* ''Film/SpaceMutiny'' has this aesthetic, with the space ship filled with CRT televisions, rows of computer keyboards stuck to walls, and New Wave fashions. The fact that much of the film was shot in an old factory makes the space ship seem technologically very analog and mechanical.

* ''Series/Maniac2018'' is set in an alternative timeline 2018. The timeframe appears to have branched off from reality in the early 1980s, and technology is both more crude and more powerful at the same time. There are sanitation robots picking up street litter, VR pornography, and an AI capable of scanning and manipulating humans brains. On the other hand, there doesn't seem to be an internet, and computers look like Commodore 64s, with small monochromatic displays and old 5 & 1/4" floppy drives.

* This is all part of the general atmosphere of {{Zeerust}} surrounding the Creator/{{BBC}}'s flagship science and technology show, ''Series/TomorrowsWorld''. It was clear in TheEighties that TW's predictions for the future could not conceive a world where cassettes had been superceded by other tech.

* ''Hostile'' is a setting for the ''TabletopGame/{{Traveller}}'' system that is deliberate homage to the future envisioned by movies like ''{{Film/Alien}}'' and ''Film/{{Outland}}''. Humanity has begun expanding into space, but the ships and colonies have a gritty industrial design, and all the technology is analogue. Computers are bulky with CRT monitors, and there is no wireless technology.

* ''[[http://english.bouletcorp.com/2011/07/07/formicapunk/ Formica Punk]]'' is basically the PunkPunk version of this trope. The name inspired a [[http://formicapunk.tumblr.com Tumblr blog]] (in French). It’s also referred as Modem Punk after the tabletop game example above.
* [[http://io9.gizmodo.com/12-futuristic-worlds-where-everybody-uses-obsolete-te-1646690502 This article]] lists several movies that feature these kind of aesthetics.

* ''VideoGame/Cyberpunk2077'' is set in a very '80s/'90s vision of what the year 2077 would look like, in keeping with the [[TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}} pen-and-paper RPG]] that it is based on. The angular cars look like they came out of ''Anime/GhostInTheShell'' or an '80s Detroit assembly line, UsefulNotes/TheEuropeanUnion (on the ascent in TheNineties after the end of the UsefulNotes/ColdWar) is an economic superpower whose "euro-dollars" are the global currency, and even with all the high-end computer technology around, the primary means of electronic data transfer is through an evolution of USB drives rather than anything resembling the internet (which, in the ''Cyberpunk'' universe, collapsed during the [[GreatOffscreenWar Fourth Corporate War]]).

* The original ''Anime/BubblegumCrisis'' is as '80s as it gets (thanks to, among other things, being a homage to ''Film/StreetsOfFire'') even if it happens in the 2030s. One example is that the "Data Units," (portable computer information storage units with hefty amounts of data on the KillerRobot Boomers and the Hardsuit PoweredArmor that are used via BrainUpload) which serve as an important MacGuffin in the backstory of two mayor characters, look like Betamax cassettes.
* ''Anime/CowboyBebop'' has a very 1970s aesthetic, including computer files that look like long-playing records, which is appropriate since it is, in fact, set in the '70s- the 2070s.

* ''Anime/GhostInTheShell'' (specially the 1995 movie) is generally pretty good at avoiding anachronisms, but it too has its moments -- for instance, despite most people being connected to a global communication network ''directly through their brains'', apparently public phones are still a thing.

* ''Film/StarWarsANewHope'' opens on Leia downloading the Death Star plans off a wall-sized computer and storing them on a "datacard" (floppy disc). The prequels replaced such tech with the HolographicTerminal. ''Film/RogueOneAStarWarsStory'' mimicked the tech seen in the original trilogy, as did the sequel trilogy to some extent, for example at the start of ''Film/StatWarsTheRiseOfSkywalker'' when information is transferred between R2-D2 and a Resistance fighter by what appears to be a SCART cable.

* ''Film/StarWarsANewHope'' opens on Leia downloading the Death Star plans off a wall-sized computer and storing them on a "datacard" (floppy disc). The prequels replaced such tech with the HolographicTerminal.

As the name implies, a good way to judge if this trope is present is the frequent use of cassettes, which were used in the decades named above to house magnetic tape ubiquitous in technology of the period, and later on often contained ROM chips for game consoles and occasionally add-ons for computing hardware. Other technologies to look out for are CRT displays, computer systems reminiscent of microcomputers like the UsefulNotes/Commodore64, freestanding hi-fi systems, small LCD displays as opposed to full color screens, [[MagicFloppyDisk floppy disks]], VHS, and loads of analog technologies. TheInternet or [[TheAlternet some analogue]] may exist, but if it's used more frequently than physical media to exchange large files, chances are that the work isn't using this trope. Optical CD disks may also be present, but no [=DVD=]s.

* The ''Franchise/{{Gundam}}'' franchise has a technological presentation that varies wildly, mostly because they are products of their time (and some like ''Victory'' justify their SchizoTech by happening AfterTheEnd), but in general it's quite a sight to see a universe in which HumongousMecha and space colonies are standard but computers still need floppy disks (''Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing'' is a good example of this).

->''"We’re deep in that magical Ridley Scott Film/Alien future. You can fly to a different solar system, but your PC won’t have a taskbar."''

->''"We’re deep in that magical Creator/RidleyScott "Alien" future. You can fly to a different solar system, but your PC won’t have a taskbar."''

->''"The game's setting is sort of like Steam Punk except with retro computers instead of steam which I guess needs a name. [=DOSpunk=]? [=CRTpunk=]? Pentiumpunk? So-nerdy-my-underpants-are-spontaneously-wedgieing-themselves-punk?"''
-->-- '''WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation''' review of ''Videogame/QuadrilateralCowboy''