Why do you Shadowrun?, What do you look for in a game? Options

[emo samurai]

I get mixed messages about what people look for in their games; the consensus amongst the "veterans," at least on my game threads, seems to be "street-levelism." That is, a constant frantic scramble for survival in the shadows of corporate giants that would stomp them to the ground if they weren't so tiny and insignificant. Then again, those same people want to play a game "where he (the hero) looks heroic, shoots the bad guy, and taps the female lead and her sister at the same time." This was said by Critias, who, in the old days of a few months ago, would constantly admonish me for not being "street level" enough.

There also seems to be a consensus against powergaming; it's bad to have stuff that is too good, to have players that are too powerful and effective. I construe this to mean that may people want good role-playing. At the same time, there seems to be a constant pressure to conform to this monochromatically dark standard; people seem to like and even require "mundane hitman/detective/hacker/gangster with a mercenary heart/chip on his shoulder/bad conscience/religious devotion to 'professionalism'" type characters; requisite cliches contrasting with a stated desire for "creativity."

The question I want to have answered is what the hell do people want out of Shadowrun? Do you want a Mary Sue hero or a whiny street emo geek? Do you want anti-productive creativityin which people try not to make specialized, effective characters or dumbass archetypes that people are, if this world has any justice, tired of? Am I not getting something, are people trying to be disagreeable for the sake of testosterone backlog, or none of the above?

Personally, I'm looking for excitement, twisted, dark humor, with moments of genuine heartbreak that are in no way diminished by the objective wrongness of the situations sprinkled in. What about you?