The Making of System Shock 2

The British gaming magazine Edge, which has teamed up with the website Next Generation, offers up a piece looking back at the creation of System Shock 2 . The cult classic storytelling horror-themed FPS has survived as a popular and often-referenced game despite the eight years between now and its release. The piece covers the reasons behind that popularity, as well as the 'horror' of an inexperienced team taking on a dauntingly high-profile task: "The original System Shock was one of the games that made Levine want to move into the videogame industry in the first place. What made it so special? 'The feeling of being in a real place,' he raves. 'The feeling of a mystery, of unraveling it - not in an adventure game way, but in the context of an action game. You arrive and... what happened? That's a really good storytelling mechanism.' Austin Grossman and Doug Church's original idea from Shock was something Irrational expanded in its sequel. 'In Shock 1 you were a specific guy, you had a backstory,' Levine notes. 'With Shock 2, I started you out with the classic 'wake up with amnesia'.'"

Comments

Bioshock and System Shock

[Silverlancer]

When Bioshock came out, I heard the hype, and was prepared to delve into the amazing awesomeness that Bioshock apparently was. Especially considering how good System Shock 2 was. So I expected that it would be as good as SS2 or better.

I installed it and began playing.

About two hours later I was bored out of my mind at the console-ized, dumbed-down mess that was Bioshock.

I reinstalled System Shock 2.

I played the entire thing through again and loved every second of it. System Shock 2 is without a doubt one of the best games of all time, worthy of any top 10 list as the best FPS-RPG ever. Probably even better than Deus Ex, though that's a hard comparison to make for sure.

Re:Bioshock and System Shock

[Nasarius]

Absolutely...spiritual successor my ass.

For those who want to play through SS2 again, check out SHTUP and Rebirth.

Re:Bioshock and System Shock

[urbanriot]

Get the hi-res textures! http://shtup.home.att.net/ There's other links as well, and many other mods like the Rebirth mod - http://www.strangebedfellows.de/index.php/topic,8.0.html

System Shock was great, and I agree, in my opinion it is better than SS2, but only just. Unfortunately, it is so old now it is painful to look at. I so wish they would remake it, sadly it is not going to happen.

Re:Bioshock and System Shock

[complexmath]

System Shock 2 was far better than Deus Ex, in my opinion. For one thing, System Shock 2 felt quite nonlinear, while Deus Ex railroaded the player through the game from start to finish. Also, Deus Ex contained some racist content that had me considering just uninstalling the game for a while. Not to mention System Shock 2's unbelievable use of sound, fantastic level design, etc. It's easily in my top ten FPS games of all time along with System Shock 1, Thief 1 & 2, Ultima Underworld, Half Life 2, and various others I can't think of right now. But Deus Ex may not be on that list.

As for Bioshock, I recently started playing the game and have been enjoying it quite a bit. I agree that the interface is more like a traditional FPS than System Shock 2 and thus "dumbed down" I suppose, but still more complex than Half Life and similar more pure FPS variants. What I really enjoy about Bioshock, though, is simply the realization of the concept within the game world. How often do you get to explore the shattered remains of a dystopian world inspired by an Ayn Rand novel? About my only potential issue so far are the few scripted "scare" scenarios I've encountered. I'd have preferred if they had been done in such a way that they at least didn't feel quite so scripted. Many of the scariest moments in System Shock 2, for example, were simply an artifact of situations I found myself in and the excellent sound work in the game--the ability to hear critters nearby but not know where they were, etc.

Re:Bioshock and System Shock

[urbanriot]

Well, both games are in my Top 5, but Deus Ex actually rewarded you with stories, points and situations that altered based on your gameplay. Kill someone earlier in the game, and a cutscene won't contain that character. Every level, you had at least two clear options on completing it... stealth or head-on, guns blazing. While System Shock 2 might have seemed more open ended, it most certainly was not; however that's a testament to the developers for making a game that seemed open ended when it was fairly straight forward. I don't know, I can't really contrast the two games since they're both personal favorites.

System Shock 2 was far better than Deus Ex, in my opinion. For one thing, System Shock 2 felt quite nonlinear, while Deus Ex railroaded the player through the game from start to finish.

Deus Ex contained some racist content that had me considering just uninstalling the game for a while. What content offended you? Are you of a particular race they offended?

I'm not a namby pamby liberal who doesn't go out of his way to be offended by comments or content that doesn't directly apply to me, so I might have missed it.

Re:Bioshock and System Shock

[thegnu]

I'm not saying that it's a bad game, I'm just saying that that sentence is logically contradictory.

I'll save GP some time:
Dumbed-down is not the same as less complex. Dumbed-down is not the opposite of complex. Dumbed down means 'Made More Stupider' whereas less complex means 'not quite so intricate.' GP was indicating this point, and stating that it had plenty of artistic and stylistic merit in its own right. Doom is not Risk dumbed-down. Doom is Doom. Risk is Risk.

Re:Bioshock and System Shock

[Sj0]

You missed a major point. In the game, you're the illegitimate child of the person who created the vita-chambers, thus one of a small handful of people who gain effective immortality through them. This, along with your brainwashing, makes you a literally unstoppable killing machine.

Would you kindly play through the game again and pay more attention to the plot?

This game looks like a total rip-off of Bioshock

[Anonymous Coward]

How unoriginal. I hope they sue.

What a great game.

[headkase]

I still have the disc and I'd play it again in a heartbeat if it would just run on a modern system - I've tried everything. With patience, my media will hopefully be useful again someday once the Open Dark Engine reaches maturity.

I played SS2 once..

[Brian Gordon]

Got to the point where you're avoiding cameras and every time you go around the corner a camera sees you. I tried various things to get past but it was just stupid, there was nothing to do. Tried various game guides, none of them had anything to say about it. So I'm not particularly fond of SS2 and I burn inside every time someone praises it.. I have a special hatred for video games that have a f'(x)=infinity learning curve and stump you after 9 seconds of playing. It's just not fun..

Re:I played SS2 once..

[Silverlancer]

You can shoot the camera. It takes one shot with your pistol. ;)

Re:I played SS2 once..

[sammyF70]

if you mean the first one you meet, on the first level you are on : just run to the camera and hit it with the wrench, if you have nothing else you can use against it. works fine ;)

Re:I played SS2 once..

[ConceptJunkie]

Somewhere in the distance, I hear the sound of someone slapping his head and screaming "D'Oh!"

Re:I played SS2 once..

[meringuoid]

Got to the point where you're avoiding cameras and every time you go around the corner a camera sees you.

Back in, oh, 2001, I was playing through Shock 2 for the first time. I was at university at the time, and I got a summer job in a book warehouse, picking out textbooks to ship out to various schools around the place. The job involved trotting around this big building grabbing books out of various aisles and throwing them onto a conveyor.

One day I was heading down an aisle in which the lights had packed in for some reason. It was dark. Not a problem, I have no fear of this. I walk down the aisle looking for the book that's on my order sheet.

At this point I spot a red light on the ceiling.

SHIT! I immediately duck to the floor and take cover behind my cart-o'-books, and reach for my gun to shoot out the camera...

At this point I realise that (a) I don't have a gun, (b) that isn't a camera but an LED indicating that a lamp is live, (c) I'm a bit of a pillock.

But for just a second or two, it was bloody terrifying. Thanks to the game designers for getting me so involved in their world. Salt the fries :-)

The original was the best

[SmallFurryCreature]

The reason it was so good was that for the first time in a game, you weren't in a game. Doom shared that a bit, was one of the first games you could just play without reading the manual. Doom was "real". What I mean by that is that a door looked like a door, worked like a door. Med packs were clearly visible and so on. Compare this to say a driving sim, where you do not have working mirrors, you can only see straight ahead, you have to drive by jerking the wheel hard left or hard right. Doom was "natural".

System shock was not, but it is the first game I remember where you really felt part of the world. Since then I learned that EVERY fps that you are alone. Think about this, even in Alien VS Predator, as either the alien or the marine, you are alone. Not so in System Shock. At one point you are reading mails from someone trying to find a safe spot, as you progress you are getting closer and closer and hope to find them alive. You don't offcourse, solo FPS is solo, but still, for a moment you felt like others were in the space station with you. A magic moment in a PC game. Perhaps even better then actually having an AI with you, this woman never got in my way, didn't commit suicide, didn't get stuck, yet I felt she was another human in this alien world.

But this is about System Shock 2 right? Can I be honest? Didn't like it as much as the original, it was too much. I would have preffered they spend more time on the bugs and less time on the three different main classes and all the various options. Nice and all but endless choice is too often an excuse for not enough flesh in the story. Shodan is back? Yeah, okay, she was nice and crazy and all but we knew her already. There was no shock. Also, the first time you were a hacker, so no wonder you were a bit crap in the beginning with combat, this time you are a soldier, so why do you still suck?

Re:System shock 2.... SYSTEM SHOCK 2?!

[Eudial]

system shock 2 is a completely overrated game loved only by fat basement dwellers

Hey! I'm a fat SS2 loving attic dweller, you insensitive clod!