1994’s FPS-RPG, System Shock, is an important game. It was an influence on not just BioShock and its sequels, but also a variety of game series in between, like Half-Life and Deus Ex. It was also a bitch to play on modern PCs, which is fortunately something this re-release should help with.
The announcement from GOG talks about what’s new in this version:
System Shock: Enhanced Edition now comes with official support for resolutions up to 1024×768 (compared to the original 640×480), and a native 854×480 widescreen mode. Gameplay is streamlined with a toggleable mouselook mode, including more intuitive inventory and item management. Combined with assorted bug-fixes and remappable controls, System Shockis now truly enhanced. Still, some gaming experiences are truly worth preserving, so you can also return to the authentic 90’s gameplay with System Shock: Classic – ready for modern systems, completely unaltered in all other aspects.
There’s also a trailer:
And a couple of comparison shots:
You can grab the game here. Also, fun fact: today’s actually the game’s twenty-first birthday. Might as well get out there for a drink, System Shock, you deserve it.
Comments
18 responses to “System Shock Enhanced, Re-Released 21 Years Later”
Absolutely!!! So much love for this game!!!
Having never played the game, and just watching th trailer, it looks…. terrible.
Well, it was released the same year as Doom II. You expecting Destiny? 😛
That was kinda my point, I missed it at the time, and looking at it now without any nostalgia to go with it, it just looks horrible, yet other games that look worse, that I enjoyed at the time, I still love the look of.
Nostalgia is a funny thing.
Yeah, probably the same reason I struggle so much with people who say they can’t play FF7 anymore. I just can’t get my head around why they think it looks that bad.
I’m a decent RPG fan, but couldn’t do FFVII, gave up quicklyish.
It sort of is. It’s a lot like GoldenEye in that for all the great stuff it did and everything it influenced it’s absurdly primitive. That whole early 3D era is full of genius cavemen.
System Shock is in my top 10 games ever. It was ground breaking and had an awesome story. Looks do not make a game. Gameplay does.
Its also why I can play Thief 2 over and over despite the terrible models and animations.
2014 Thief on the other hand…
I still occasionally play the Ultima VII’s
Sadly though, while Ultima IV was in my opinion THE most groundbreaking game ever made (doing something no other game developer has been willing to take on since), there is only so much this nostalgic old bugger can handle. A reboot of Ultima IV would be heaven. Unfortunately, EA holds the IP.
Huh. This game had actually been available for free online if you know where to look for ages- I’d downloaded it and tried playing it a bit, but I found it a bit too unwieldy and it fell onto the “something for later” pile (and I lost it when I upgraded my PC). I seriously never thought they’d ever get through whatever issues were keeping it from being rereleased and put it out onto GoG- but then again, GoG has surprised me before (finally getting the Alpha Centauri expansion out, for example). It looks like truly nothing is beyond them. Time to give this game a proper second look.
Been a mouselook mod floating around for a few years, I played the game for the first time with it. Thought it held up pretty well.
If they do one for System Shock 2 I’ll be interested. A friend and I tried the co-op but it bugged out on our newer systems. Would love to try it again.
Sometimes I love gamers. System Shock (and it’s brilliant sequel) are key milestones in the development of some of my favourite games.
Top stuff!
totally re-playing this 🙂 SHODAN LIVES!
so much love for the original 2 shock games.
I suppose it’s too much to ask for a PS4 release…
It’d be glorious, alas I doubt it will ever happen…
Yay! I originally tried it when it was abandonware and had that virus false positive, got about 10 minutes in and gave up because the controls were awful, thankfully this fix should make it much more playable =)