Vol.
2, Issue 4
December 2, 1999
ix
years ago I did the preliminary game design work on System
Shock, spending three or four months on it before I left Looking
Glass Technologies for graduate school. Naturally, when System
Shock 2 came out I was eager to see what it was all about.
It was like coming back home after many years. Mind you, a rusted-metal,
cyborg-infested, virus-ridden, insane-AI-controlled, derelict
drifting-in-space sort of home.
I had
had a brief glimpse of the work-in-progress in December '98, and
I had read the rave reviews on the web. I got hold of a copy and
booked some time on my roommate's computer. I was unemployed,
and kicking SHODAN's ass was my new occupation. I took the job
pro bono.
The game
makes a good first impression. I had a smooth installation on
the first try, even on my flat mate's mongrel system. The introductory
screens ooze production values. Character generation is quirky
but fun, an involved process that gives your guy a little prehistory,
harking back to the old Traveler system -- by joining one of three
government services you give yourself a boost in one of three
skill-areas -- physical combat, technology, or psionics -- and
your subsequent job assignments give you further skill and ability
bonuses.
System
Shock 2 has a vast array of skills, and although your service
choice gives you a head start in one direction, you can gain ability
in any of them once the game starts. There's a kind of compromise
here between a skill-based and a class-based character system,
that left me feeling a bit lukewarm: it aroused in me an initial
hunger for character-differentiation that then went unsatisfied
when I realized how fluid the system was. I started out trying
to build a kind of hacker-technician character, but as soon as
I got into the game I panicked and started buying up combat skills
left and right, and by the end I felt sort of generic. Okay, arguably
I have only myself to blame.
On the
other hand, the designers did succeed in creating a complex skill-system
in which the skills have a tangible effect on your abilities in
the world. There are so many numbers -- including both character
stats like strength and agility, and skill ratings -- it's no
mean feat to have made them all matter in the game.
The story
premise is terrific -- it's fully in the spirit of the original,
but creates a whole new chapter. I'll try not to say too much:
mankind's first faster-than-light voyage ends in disaster, as
the colony ship and its military escort become a battleground
between human scientists and sinister (and, may I say, disgusting)
other forces. (One can feel a whole future-history taking shape
here, a surprisingly complex dystopia dominated by corporate interests,
and it makes me wonder if anything further will ever be set there.)
As usual you're caught in the middle: you wake up with your memory
gone, equipped only with a state-of-the-art neural interface and
a stubborn will not to get be iced.
