The game goes on to surprise you again and again with new developments and ingenious ties to the original game, finally culminating in yet another brilliant twist that has left us aching for a sequel these last six years. This unseen twist ranks right up there with "Aeris dies" as one of the most shocking and effective video game plot devices we've ever encountered.
#System shock 2 characters series
Midway through the game, you finally reach her hiding place, only to discover that the assistance has been coming from none other than SHODAN, the malevolent AI from the original game, who through a series of strange circumstances has become embedded in the Von Braun's computer system. Almost from the beginning, you receive help via voice comm from a scientist allegedly stranded in the upper decks of the ship. A terrible biological collective known as the Many has overrun the Von Braun and its piggybacked security ship, the Rickenbacker, and as the lone survivor, it's up to you to investigate the horrible goings-on and find a way off the doomed, derelict ships.īut then, you're not really the only survivor of the disaster. You awaken on the historic vessel Von Braun to find the rest of the crew slaughtered.or worse, mutated into monstrosities beyond recognition. The new story takes place 42 years later, as humankind is attempting its first leap into faster-than-light travel.
When Irrational took the reins of the franchise some five years later, it didn't merely crank out a cookie-cutter sequel in which you fight SHODAN again in some generic locale. The first System Shock pitted you as an unnamed hacker against SHODAN, a rogue artificial intelligence that had overrun a space station and was threatening the very future of humanity itself. Three classes, branching weapons and skill trees - System Shock 2 had replay value to spare. The sequel to the wildly innovative System Shock, a hybrid action-adventure game that was itself well ahead of its time, Shock 2 significantly upped the ante in dramatic and mechanical terms, creating an utterly engrossing, terrifying gameplay experience that we remember fondly as one of the greatest of all time. Long before Grand Theft Auto established the video game sandbox, before "emergent gameplay" was an industrywide buzzword, upstart developer Irrational Games married first-person action akin to that of Doom and Half-Life with rich, open-ended character development and a masterfully crafted, horror-tinged storyline to create System Shock 2. System Shock fans should be optimistic we feel the very inclusion of "Shock" in the new game's title is an indication that Irrational's heart is in the right place with this one. Luckily, Irrational has soldiered on it's now working on BioShock, a "spiritual successor" to the System Shock series that will further the concept of emergent gameplay in a different setting. The behemoth publisher has so far shown no interest in reviving the franchise itself or relinquishing its rights to a more willing third party. The future of the franchise is now in what seems like permanent limbo, since Electronic Arts controls the System Shock name at this time.
Unfortunately, none of those news items relate to the announcement of System Shock 3. And finally, amazingly, the venerable is still in operation, providing news updates on every conceivable topic related to System Shock that's still active, even six years after the last game's release. Then there's ShockEd, the only available level editor for System Shock 2, which some fans have used to create unofficial extra missions and modifications for the original game (many of which are archived on the same site). Even Irrational itself tweaked the game's design after release, allowing players to control such gameworld variables as the monsters' respawn rates to better fit their playing styles.
#System shock 2 characters upgrade
Homebrew projects such as System Shock Rebirth and SHTUP (Shock Texture Upgrade Project) seek to replace the original game's character models and texture maps (respectively) with better, more-detailed ones.
Such is fans' devotion to System Shock 2 that, in the continuing absence of a sequel, the most ardent devotees of the action role-playing-game classic have worked to preserve its legacy by keeping its presentation as close to modern standards as the game's now-antiquated engine will allow.
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