Renault on 31/5/2023 at 20:19

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I had a funny glitch, I died coming out of the elevator from Medical into Research, and the elevator music continued, right through my death, reload and resurrection back in Medical. I had to actually go back to the elevator, return to the Research level, and then leave and get a certain distance away from the elevator before it faded out. That music is really maddening to listen to for such a long period of time.

catbarf on 31/5/2023 at 22:43

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Just finished it. Overall I like a lot of the ways they changed the game to match modern design sensibilities, while some of the things they left intact from the original are questionable, so my complaints aren't really traditionalism- though some of the changes do feel unnecessary and for the worse.

Good:

-The combat is much improved. Many of the enemies in the original might as well have been turrets, but here they're mobile and aggressive, with a greater variety of behaviors depending on enemy type. Corner-peeking is still a solid strategy but many enemies will close the distance quickly or shoot if you expose yourself too long. It's much more similar to SS2, although the additions of weak spots and model-based hit detection make it more modern than that. It's a solid change that makes the game actually a shooter, and not purely an adventure game.

-Puzzles are very similar but a bit more in-depth. The wire puzzles in particular have been reworked in a way that's easier to understand but takes longer to resolve; more analyzing and less guess-and-check. Also a good improvement.

-I remember there was some grumbling about the levels being darker, but I like the changes. They're still visually distinctive from one another, but the darker baseline on some levels means there's more variation in lighting within the level. I never found myself stumbling around in the dark. The one major change I noticed, visually, was the Bridge no longer having the Giger-esque patterning on the walls.

-With modern graphics and a better map, I found it easier to keep track of the level layouts. It really isn't a maze, there's just a lot to explore, and the increase in visual fidelity helps to distinguish same-y corridors.

-The mission progression and story beats are all faithful to the original, and the re-recorded audio generally sounds great.

-The weapon roster has been greatly simplified, but I didn't find myself missing anything. The weapons that are in the game are more distinct from one another than their SS1 counterparts, and there are fewer straight upgrades.

Mixed:

-The enemy roster is more of a mixed bag. A few new ones have been added, but some are conspicuously redundant- the Invisible Mutants on deck 3 are now just cloaking Zero-G Mutants, and the Mobile Laser is just a Hopper with treads. The Mantis Assassin is a totally new enemy, and a joke at that, because it has so much chatter there's no way it can take you by surprise. Still, I do really like that the enemies have varied attacks now, and they feel more different from one another.

-Cyberspace is much improved, but software upgrades are gone so it gets repetitive quickly (by your third cyberspace adventure you've seen everything there is to see), and it isn't clearly communicated how some of the software works. I was never actually able to get Recall to function.

-While I like the revised audio logs on the whole, the Kickstarter backer ones are typified by scenery-chewing, and made all the more obvious by having a 'KS-' prefix on the audio log. Plus, some of the new logs seem unnecessary and fanservice-y, like one that addresses a plot hole in SS2.

-The implant system is also simplified for playability, and I appreciate how they reworked some of the implants (eg the Sensaround). But some of them are a little wonky; the target analyzer in particular requires you to hit a key to analyze the target, requiring close range and line of sight so it's probably already shooting at you. Seems like the sort of thing that should just be automatic.

-The grid inventory is clearly inspired by SS2 and the conventions of modern FPS-RPGs, but I found it to be a pretty substantial change. Weapons are large enough, particularly with upgrades, that I could never carry more than 3-4 of them at a time, and that did feel constraining since all your ammo, patches, grenades, and scrap also take up space. I liked that they added a little cargo chute that moves between levels so you can bring some stuff along, but it's quite small, and the new weapon upgrade system encourages you to hang onto weapons. I also found it hard to distinguish between cylindrical patches, cylindrical mines, and cylindrical ammo; everything that isn't a weapon blurs together.

-The game is generally faithful to the original map layouts, for better or for worse. There are alterations here and there, and yet some of the more frustrating elements (like the long slog through the southern end of Executive, which you'll have to do multiple times) were left unchanged. But I don't find it nearly as mazelike as some people describe.

-The resurrection system now works across decks, unless you play on the hardest difficulty. In original SS1 and SS2, if you hadn't activated the resurrection machine on a given deck, you died and had to reload a save. Here, you'll just respawn on a different level at no cost other than the tedium of getting back to where you were. I found myself often reloading saves rather than using the machine, but if you play the game as intended there's no real challenge.

-The graphical style. Yeah, I know, they wanted it to look retro. But the realistic effects and lighting make the deliberately pixelated textures look to me more like the Unreal engine is struggling to load high-res textures. It's disappointing because the game looks really good in some areas- I especially love the First Contact esque targeting lasers on cyborgs spearing through fog- but seeing those textures up close in animations never stopped being a jarring contrast. YMMV.

-While I like that they kept the story beats the same, the lack of any sort of objective log or even in-game notes is an odd choice. I imagine a lot of first-time players are going to get lost, and keeping a notepad and pen by the computer (let alone console) is way less acceptable in 2023 than it was in 1994. The audio logs and emails are clearer about conveying critical information, but if you miss one you might wander around stuck for a while.

-The music is more moody and atmospheric, except when it isn't. I don't know if a remake of the original soundtrack would really be fitting to the game's style, but on some levels you have quiet ambient that suddenly explodes into distorted guitar riffs when an enemy sees you.

-Enemy respawning is very high on each level to start with, but enemies stop respawning altogether once security hits 0%. It makes backtracking through prior levels tedious rather than tense. It's a nice touch that you can see a 'cage' pop up into the level to disgorge a respawning enemy, but I had enemies regularly respawning in the same room as me. Also, one time I got caught inside the cage and dragged into the void, which was funny.

Bad:

-Animations for everything. A five-second movement-slowing animation every time I pick up an audio log or USB stick. An animation every time I recharge off an energy station or cure radiation, and a longer one for using a medbay. It gets old, and the long animations discourage using patches or throwables in combat.

-The economy is a really unnecessary addition. I had to spend a fair bit of time grabbing and recycling junk to afford weapon mods, let alone ammo or healing items from the vending machines. Maybe they added this system just to be more like SS2, but SS2 had me finding credits regularly. Here, I found next to no credits and had to recycle for almost all of it.

-A bunch of minor QoL issues. Some text is hard to read. The menu distortions when injured make it harder to find and apply a healing item under stress. When reloading a saved game, corpses don't seem to enable physics until visible, so I'd go around a corner and freak out as a corpse settles into a more comfortable pose. No apparent key to split stacks of items. A room on the Flight Deck with no escape (a dead end up a grav shaft that can't be reversed). No legend for some of the objects on the map.

-The intro is a bit janky, but the bizarre final boss fight and end cutscene might constitute the worst finale I've seen in the last few years.

tl;dr Not going to blow anyone's socks off, but a solid 7/10 or 8/10 remake. It's just a bit incoherent, with multiple design philosophies clashing- in some areas it's a faithful remaster, in some it's a modernized remake, and in others it's trying to be a different game altogether; given the game's development history this isn't all that surprising. I'm fairly happy with what we got, but I have to wonder what could have been had they stuck to the original Kickstarter.

Kamlorn on 1/6/2023 at 00:42

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Look at you, henke: a pathetic creature of meat and bone, panting and sweating as you run through my newly rtx-lightened corridors. How can you challenge a perfect, immortal System Shock 1994?
In a few minutes my cyborgs will have you, and will bring you to an electrified interrogation bench where you'll learn more about pain than you ever wanted to know.

heywood on 1/6/2023 at 03:01

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On this point, I'm glad it's a remake and not a re-imagining.

Getting lost and not knowing what to do next are an important part of the System Shock experience. You're supposed to explore what's open to you, read all the logs and messages, and figure it out. It's satisfying, and it's not even that hard. You don't need to be clever to progress, just thorough. Figuring it out on my own was central to enjoying SS1, so much so that I haven't played SS1 past the opening level since the Kickstarter was put up, in the hope that I'd forget what to do as much as possible before playing the remake.

I also don't understand why taking notes is a big deal. It's such a basic life skill.



So far I like the change. It gives you a reward for finding all the cameras, which can feel grindy, but not as grindy as re-clearing the same areas over and over. All the backtracking I did the first time I played SS1 was definitely tedious!

I generally agree with all your other points except the music, which definitely falls into the bad category for me.

Thanks for the good writeup.

henke on 1/6/2023 at 05:56

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Ok I'm 2.5h in, still in the first level. Guys, I'm STUCK! Do I need a logic probe to use the circuit/wire puzzles? I managed to fill up the bar on the side on one of the wire puzzles but nothing seemed to happen.

I made it farther than this in the demo. Did they make this harder since then?

edit: nevermind, had a shower and a revelation. Figured out how to get past the first puzzle. Still don't know what logic probe is for tho, is that just if you wanna bypass the whole thing? I ran around the whole floor looking for one, thinking it was essential.