Also, now clicking around the map produces pop-up text that’s meant to make Citadel feel more like a real place, but at the moment really doesn’t. It feels distracting rather than immersive. The only real modern addition I’m not sold on is the way that picking up equipment like the messaging unit now involves overly long cut-scenes where the Hacker stares and tosses it from hand to hand while a pop-up explains. Most dramatically, where System Shock’s idea of windows was originally black wall panels with dots painted on them, now we get proper skybox-driven views of Citadel Station and Saturn proper. Where the now classic code 451 was originally in a datalog, now it’s painted across the wall in suitably smeary blood.
Likewise, while the opening Medical Suite area is extremely faithful to the original map, this reworking adds a few flourishes that simply make sense-notably a reception desk at the entrance and some comfy chairs for visitors. Just the use of greebles on the walls to have bits sticking out and sucking in instantly makes things feel fresher. Ordinarily, a level designed over 20 years ago is going to feel pretty simplistic regardless of how it’s updated, but no. The section of Shock’s first level in the demo-a tiny, tiny slice of a huge space-follows its aesthetic down to the letter. You don’t often hear this, but check out the walls. This is a chance to put their own stamp onto it. It’s System Shock, but it’s also new license-holders Nightdive Studios proving they can handle the franchise-System Shock 3 is on the way, in partnership with Otherside Entertainment. It even adds a few clever tricks of its own.
This isn’t just an HD remaster, but a complete rebuild intended to take advantage of what was almost unthought-of technology for the time. And yet, saying that the alpha demo is simply the same does it a disservice.
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