Retreview: System Shock 2

System Shock 2 is many things. It's 13 years old now, a teenager. It's the spiritual predecessor to Bioshock. It was described as "[one of the] twin barrels of modern FPS innovation," by Sid Shuman of GamePro, the other of course being Deus Ex. It is also the subject of the first Retreview.

In Brief:

System Shock 2 was one of the first games to bridge the FPS and RPG genres. It's set in a futuristic, steampunk, sci-fi reality. Between the initial introduction, the blaring techno soundtrack, the muffled moans of the Hybrids, the dramatically voiced datalogs and the scarce but manageable resources at your disposal this game is pure thrill. 

The atmosphere it creates is intense, I always felt like I was one moment away from complete understanding and certain death. Though I did not play through the entire game I feel have played enough to give my opinions.

Enjoyment:

I thoroughly enjoyed the atmosphere set in this game. It didn't make me feel happy to be in Space, but the intensity of the environment chilled me, I was fearful of every dark room, the moaning of the hybrids and the high pitched keening of the chimps had me on edge. The danger of running out of resources is ever present.

It was more immersive than any thriller type game I've ever played. Though this was not specifically to my tastes anyone who loves to be on edge, putting the puzzle of the world together around them will thoroughly enjoy this world.

I also loved the datalogs and the way information is drip fed to you throughout the game. I'm a big fan of games where I have to be the detective, working out the story as I progress. System Shocks environment makes this quest difficult but all the more rewarding for what you discover.

The gunplay itself is fairly standard. FPS hasn't come a long way since 1999 but there hasn't been much to improve on. You point, you click, they die. It's solid. Navigating the menus is tedious and is at odds with and complimentary to the environment at the same time. It's intense trying to navigate the menus to find the thing you want to use whilst trying to avoid the enemies but at the same time the frustration with it separates you from the immersion of the game. Things have come along way since then.

There's a lot of character customisation available to you in this game. From the three branches at the start you can specialise by taking skills, attributes and abilities to improve your strengths and cater for your weaknesses. This give the game a lot of replayability - this is probably why there's still such a strong following 13 years down the line.

Whilst this kind of experience, intense and terrifying, isn't normally my cup of tea there's definitely a lot of enjoyment here for someone made of stronger stuff.

Accessibility:

You can't buy this game anywhere. It's not at Good Old Games, it's not on Steam. It's on eBay and Amazon as a used product if you're desperate but is freely available for pirating via torrent. I don't know what the solution is here for you if you're against that sort of thing, I'd certainly love to own a copy of this game somehow.

It's not hard to setup, there are quite a large number of guides out there to get it to run on newer systems. I just bought a new computer, all new parts and it took me all of 30 minutes once I'd acquired the game to get it to run, and a few more tweaks to make it playable. There's plenty of aid to get it going for you.

Time:

Time's a huge factor here, it takes a little while to get the game running, and it is by no means an easy game. I didn't finish it but had invested 5-10 hours total play time getting my head around it, navigating the menus, rerolling to make sure I'd got it right.

If you break through that time barrier, or if you have a better knack for what is practically survival horror, you'll need at least this much time to find your bearings and then more hours on op of that to finish the entire game. 

In Closing:

In today's terms, 5 hours is a long time to get used to a game. System Shock 2 is an excellent game, I could work through the atmosphere and the UI (and have done with other games) but Time is the biggest barrier here for me considering I work a full time job with other social requirements going on (and hundreds of other games!) but if you have that time and more then System Shock 2 is definitely worth investing yourself in.