Re: System Shock - The Remake
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2019 12:13 am
And I have already played through it, and dumped a massive wall of notes on the devs.
I'm actually impressed with how much of the "feel" of the original System Shock this very early demo of the first level was able to deliver, considering they rebuilt the whole thing from scratch in Unreal. (Maybe that's as much a testament to the amazing design of the original as it is to the skill of the NightDive team.)
The only thing I really dislike is how horribly dark they've made the whole level -- we're talking DOOM 3 dark here. And there's no flashlight. It's really unnecessary; the geometry of the levels makes it easy for hostiles to hide and get the drop on you if you're not careful, deliberate, and leeeeeeeeeeaning around corners. Instead, the first level in the remake demo is just pitch black nearly everywhere, lit only by the occasional spotlight and the vast quantity of day-glo neon wall lights covering every wall and ceiling and floor (but which barely emit any area light). This makes it darn near impossible to really explore the game world -- the only way to know if an interactible object is nearby is if the cursor changes because you were close enough to such an object and accidentally put the cursor over it.
The original game does include a head-mounted lamp. So theoretically the remake could drop a lamp hardware on some other level somewhere, then let you backtrack to roam around the dark first level again (with respawning enemies to steal some of your ammo). But that really doesn't seem to me to be a good way of maintaining the game's intensity. So I've "explained" all this to the devs. Again. At length. That will surely make them change their minds, right?
Anyway, lighting aside, it's fantastic just how much of the original game's goodness is in this remake demo, while it still improves dramatically on that game's graphics. (Puzzles are getting a much-deserved update, too. That's one of the few parts of the original game I thought hasn't held up well.)
There's even... but I won't spoil it. If you get some time today -- while the demo is still available to non-backers -- you might try it. I'd be interested in hearing what folks here think.
(Notes: If you change the display mode to Fullscreen, the game will crash on you unless you go into /Users/[user]/AppData/Local/SystemReShock/Saved/Config/WindowsNoEditor/GameUserSettings.ini and set the value of FullscreenMode to "1". [Unless they've already fixed this in their first hotfix patch.] Also, you can reload the Magnum by pressing "T" the first time to cycle through ammo, then "R".)
I'm actually impressed with how much of the "feel" of the original System Shock this very early demo of the first level was able to deliver, considering they rebuilt the whole thing from scratch in Unreal. (Maybe that's as much a testament to the amazing design of the original as it is to the skill of the NightDive team.)
The only thing I really dislike is how horribly dark they've made the whole level -- we're talking DOOM 3 dark here. And there's no flashlight. It's really unnecessary; the geometry of the levels makes it easy for hostiles to hide and get the drop on you if you're not careful, deliberate, and leeeeeeeeeeaning around corners. Instead, the first level in the remake demo is just pitch black nearly everywhere, lit only by the occasional spotlight and the vast quantity of day-glo neon wall lights covering every wall and ceiling and floor (but which barely emit any area light). This makes it darn near impossible to really explore the game world -- the only way to know if an interactible object is nearby is if the cursor changes because you were close enough to such an object and accidentally put the cursor over it.
The original game does include a head-mounted lamp. So theoretically the remake could drop a lamp hardware on some other level somewhere, then let you backtrack to roam around the dark first level again (with respawning enemies to steal some of your ammo). But that really doesn't seem to me to be a good way of maintaining the game's intensity. So I've "explained" all this to the devs. Again. At length. That will surely make them change their minds, right?
Anyway, lighting aside, it's fantastic just how much of the original game's goodness is in this remake demo, while it still improves dramatically on that game's graphics. (Puzzles are getting a much-deserved update, too. That's one of the few parts of the original game I thought hasn't held up well.)
There's even... but I won't spoil it. If you get some time today -- while the demo is still available to non-backers -- you might try it. I'd be interested in hearing what folks here think.
(Notes: If you change the display mode to Fullscreen, the game will crash on you unless you go into /Users/[user]/AppData/Local/SystemReShock/Saved/Config/WindowsNoEditor/GameUserSettings.ini and set the value of FullscreenMode to "1". [Unless they've already fixed this in their first hotfix patch.] Also, you can reload the Magnum by pressing "T" the first time to cycle through ammo, then "R".)