Cyberpunk and neon buildings
Build a futuristic city: a neon tower with messy stacked boxes, a building full of hologram billboards, a capsule tower, an arcology with hanging gardens, a neon sign with your own word or a sky bridge between two towers. Every city number gives a different city. Click blocks you have placed to keep track of where you are.
Text
Size
City
Colours
Front and side view at night: light blocks glow, darker is further away. Click a layer to view it on the right. The plan shows everything from above.
Build breakdown
Per layer, from top to bottom
Size = width × depth of what stands on that layer. Click a layer to view it.
| Layer | Size | Parts | Blocks |
|---|
Parts and blocks
Neon, glass and plants always keep their own block. Concrete and frames follow the façade or your block palette.
| Part | Block | Count | Stacks |
|---|
Build tips
- First build the bare tower with floors and the façade grid. Only then hang the boxes, balconies and boards on it, from the bottom up.
- Light blocks behind stained glass give a soft neon glow. Try magenta or cyan glass in front of a sea lantern.
- An end rod is a thin light tube. Put a few along the edges of a board for real neon tubes.
- Build a cyberpunk city at night or set the time to night. Only then do you really see how the neon works.
- Azalea leaves you place yourself do not decay. In the download they are fixed with persistent=true.
- Does a city not look right? Press New city or pick another city number. The number is in your link too.
3D and layer-by-layer build plan
To Minecraft
Download the design as a schematic file and paste it into your world with WorldEdit, or rebuild it from a hologram in Litematica. Concrete, glass and frames come from the chosen façade, the neon from the neon colours. Turn on your block palette to choose concrete and frames yourself.
Shopping list
Add the amounts of this design to your list. There you see everything together, converted to stacks and shulker boxes.
How it is calculated
History and fun facts
Where the word comes from
Cyberpunk is a kind of science fiction about the near future. Cities are crowded, dark and wet with rain, and neon hangs everywhere. Big companies hold the power, and ordinary people live among the technology.
The word comes from a short story by Bruce Bethke from 1983. The novel Neuromancer by William Gibson (1984) made the style famous. The film Blade Runner (1982) gave it a face: towers, billboards, smoke and neon in the rain.
Neon and advertising
The French inventor Georges Claude showed the first neon tubes in Paris in 1910. A glass tube filled with neon gas glows red when electricity runs through it. Later, other gases and coloured glass gave other colours.
In the 20th century, neon signs filled the streets of Las Vegas, Times Square in New York, Hong Kong and the Shinjuku district in Tokyo. Cyberpunk uses these busy, bright streets as its model.
Kowloon Walled City
Until 1993, Hong Kong had the Kowloon Walled City: a block of hundreds of buildings pressed together, up to fourteen floors high. Tens of thousands of people lived on a very small piece of land.
Residents kept adding boxes, balconies and rooms. Because of that, every facade was different. You see that messy look in many cyberpunk games and films, and in the neon tower with boxes in this tool.
Capsules and Metabolism
In the 1960s, a group of Japanese architects called the Metabolists wanted buildings that could grow. You attach rooms as separate capsules to a core, and replace them when they get old.
The Nakagin Capsule Tower in Tokyo by Kisho Kurokawa (1972) is the best-known example. Each capsule had one round window. The tower was demolished in 2022, but a few capsules have been kept in museums.
Arcology: a city in one building
An arcology is a huge building that holds a whole city: homes, work, shops and gardens. The Italian-American architect Paolo Soleri came up with the word. Since 1970, people have been building his test city Arcosanti in the Arizona desert.
In science fiction, arcologies are often stepped pyramids with hanging gardens. Sky bridges between towers and monorails are also part of the image of the future city, as in the game Cyberpunk 2077 and the film Akira.
Did you know?
- Real neon gas only gives red-orange light. Other colours of 'neon' use other gases or a coating inside the tube.
- Blade Runner is set in Los Angeles in the year 2019.
- The Nakagin Capsule Tower had 140 capsules.
- The word cyberspace comes from William Gibson.
- The Kowloon Walled City was demolished in 1993 and 1994. A park now stands in its place.
About this tool
With this Minecraft cyberpunk planner you build a futuristic neon city. Choose a neon tower with messy stacked boxes, a building full of hologram ads, a capsule tower, an arcology with hanging gardens, a neon sign with your own word, or a sky bridge or monorail between two towers.
You set the width, depth, number of floors and height per floor. An arcology can be square or round, with steps and terraces. For a neon sign you type a word of up to 12 characters (A to Z and 0 to 9) and choose the scale, separate letters or a board with a neon edge, and whether the letters sit side by side or stacked. For a sky bridge you choose a glass walkway, a bridge with an arch, or a monorail with a train.
Every city number from 1 to 9999 gives a different city, with the boxes, balconies and signs in different places. The density sets how full it gets. You choose the neon colours (pink and cyan, green, orange or rainbow) and the facade, from grey concrete with iron to white concrete with blue glass. The front views show the building at night, so you can see how the neon glows.
The layer plan shows every block, you can view everything in 3D, and the tool counts the blocks per part in stacks. With the block palette you choose your own concrete and frames, and with the .schem download you paste the design into your world with WorldEdit or Litematica. That way you build a cyberpunk city in Minecraft, one tower at a time.
Frequently asked questions
How do I make neon light in Minecraft?
There is no real neon block, but you can imitate it well. Put a light block, such as a sea lantern, behind magenta or cyan stained glass. That gives a soft glow. End rods are thin light tubes; place them along the edge of a sign for real neon tubes.
What does the city number do?
The city number decides where the boxes, balconies, signs and ads go. Every number from 1 to 9999 gives a different city. If you do not like it, press New city. The number is also in your link, so you can share a design.
In what order do I build a neon tower?
First build the bare tower with floors and the facade grid. Then attach the boxes, balconies and signs, from bottom to top. Set the time to night when you are done; only then do you see how the neon works.
Will the leaves in my hanging gardens decay?
No. Leaves that you place by hand do not decay. In the .schem file, the azalea leaves are set with persistent=true, so they stay after pasting too.
How many blocks do I need?
The top shows the total in blocks and stacks, with the number of light blocks listed separately. Below the layer plan you see, per part, which block you need and how many. Neon, glass and plants always keep their own block; concrete and frames follow the facade or your block palette.
Does this work in Bedrock?
The layer plan works in every edition. The .schem file is for Java Edition with WorldEdit or Litematica. For even taller towers there is the skyscraper generator.