Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.
"This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.
Depends on how you look at it i suppose. Compared to Doom 2016 (i haven't played Eternal but i imagine it'll be similar), Doom 3 is much closer to Doom 1, but that is mainly in comparison to that. But Doom 3 was intentionally more horror focused than Doom 1 (which i do not remember ever thinking that was scary - but then again i've read weird games that people found scary when they were kids... i guess the scary part comes from being a kid, not the game being scary itself).
Yeah, I remember thinking Half-Life was terrifying when I played it as a small child. One of my earliest videogame-related memories is being too scared to walk down a corridor because the thought that a headcrab zombie would jump out at me was too horrific to bear.
It's probably got something to do with technological progress through the 90s - there's something uncanny about increasingly realistic 3D worlds. I can see how System Shock might have been unnerving when it came out. I bet kids who go back and play Doom, System Shock and Half-Life today see them more as fun fast-paced action games, rather than being anything remotely scary.
Well System Shock was considered an horror game at the time... System Shock 2 was considered one of the most scary game ever made. Even Doom (1993) was considered a scary game. Now we have Doom Eternal, a gay coloured Mario-clone "spiritual" successor of Doom, and Bioshock Infinite, a spiritual succesor of System Shock.... How things are changed during the years.
SS2 scared the shit out of me when I was younger. I think it was a mixture of the tension of wandering enemies and the excellent sound design.
You'd be minding your own business in a corridor then hear a hybrid in the background, then another hybrid screaming at you as it charged at you from behind.
Doom and System Shock 1 feel positively jaunty in this age, seeing modern attempts at illustrating what designers of the past tried to make with the limitations of their time is still the most interesting part of any current Re-/master/make/imagining. The dark, gore-slicked passages ought to compliment SHODAN's dialogue better, if nothing else.
Doom was definitely meant to be at least a little scary but I'm not sure about System Shock. The fast techno music, the bright colours, SHODAN mocking you constantly ("nice jump"), the cyberspace sections, even the 7 hour countdown all make me think the game was never meant to be particularly scary, just very tense and thrilling. The plot itself also has something darkly funny about it - SHODAN's ridiculous array of backup plans (including DOWNLOADING ITSELF INTO THE INTERNET), each capable of wiping out all life on Earth, is pretty hilarious, as is the fact that the only person capable of stopping them is some twink loser with really shitty broken augs and a lead pipe.
Still can't help but feel like this remake is missing the tone of the original. If I was in charge of such a project, I'd lean much harder into the crazy action-packed side of System Shock, rather than the very limited horror side. Remaster the original music, try to replicate the original game's enemy count so you're often being chased by like 10 enemies at once, have everything bright, colourful and well-lit (except deck 3 obviously), etc. Make the player constantly aware of the countdown to the station's destruction and encourage them to play frantically and boldly, as in the original, rather than encouraging them to skulk around in the dark taking their time. The station is going to blow up in a few hours, there's no time to stand around being scared by mutants. Increase SHODAN's presence a little and also increase Rebecca Lansing's presence, so she calls you a lot more frequently to give you constant updates on exactly how fucked you are.
Lots of devs are focused on creating horror scenes, not realizing that just having enemies able to path all across levels with some poorly lit areas is the scariest shit ever.
SS1 had some areas that were kind of scary but the resurrection stations and overall large amount of resources really scaled back the sense of foreboding. By the midgame you are basically a jedi on rollerskates.
Depends on how you look at it i suppose. Compared to Doom 2016 (i haven't played Eternal but i imagine it'll be similar), Doom 3 is much closer to Doom 1, but that is mainly in comparison to that. But Doom 3 was intentionally more horror focused than Doom 1 (which i do not remember ever thinking that was scary - but then again i've read weird games that people found scary when they were kids... i guess the scary part comes from being a kid, not the game being scary itself).
There lots of darker horror type moments in the first episode of Doom, along with monster closets and lights turning off and all the rest. Then it ramps up with more monsters and faster pacing as it goes. Doom 3 follows pretty much exactly the same formula, IMO. It just never gets balls to the wall like Doom 1 and 2 did later on.
There lots of darker horror type moments in the first episode of Doom, along with monster closets and lights turning off and all the rest. Then it ramps up with more monsters and faster pacing as it goes. Doom 3 follows pretty much exactly the same formula, IMO. It just never gets balls to the wall like Doom 1 and 2 did later on.
There are a couple of dark areas in Doom 1's first episode about but overall the game is much brighter, open and fast-paced than Doom 3 ever was. But what you describe with what Doom 3 does was pretty much what every FPS did since Doom 1 (and some reviewers at the time mentioned how Doom 3's gameplay felt antiquated) or even Wolfenstein 3D if you ignore the lighting part. By the time Doom 3 came out, scary lights and monster ramp up was very common (e.g. many people remember the introduction of Skaarj in Unreal).
I think it's very important to remember that when the first Doom was just released, most gamers didn't have sound cards. As it was very difficult to convince the parents that the sound card was important and necessary. My first sound card was given to me for my birthday only in 1996. And without Bobby Prince's music the atmosphere of Doom felt very different: much more scary and horrory.
There are a couple of dark areas in Doom 1's first episode about but overall the game is much brighter, open and fast-paced than Doom 3 ever was. But what you describe with what Doom 3 does was pretty much what every FPS did since Doom 1 (and some reviewers at the time mentioned how Doom 3's gameplay felt antiquated) or even Wolfenstein 3D if you ignore the lighting part. By the time Doom 3 came out, scary lights and monster ramp up was very common (e.g. many people remember the introduction of Skaarj in Unreal).
Yeah, I mean to be clear I'm not saying Doom 3 is just like the originals. I just think it's closer and more inspired by them than people think. I always hear people say it's like a completely different genre and series and I don't think that's true. It takes certain aspects of the originals and emphasizes them more than others.
I think it's very important to remember that when the first Doom was just released, most gamers didn't have sound cards. As it was very difficult to convince the parents that the sound card was important and necessary. My first sound card was given to me for my birthday only in 1996. And without Bobby Prince's music the atmosphere of Doom felt very different: much more scary and horrory.
Doom was definitely meant to be at least a little scary but I'm not sure about System Shock. The fast techno music, the bright colours, SHODAN mocking you constantly ("nice jump"), the cyberspace sections, even the 7 hour countdown all make me think the game was never meant to be particularly scary, just very tense and thrilling. The plot itself also has something darkly funny about it - SHODAN's ridiculous array of backup plans (including DOWNLOADING ITSELF INTO THE INTERNET), each capable of wiping out all life on Earth, is pretty hilarious, as is the fact that the only person capable of stopping them is some twink loser with really shitty broken augs and a lead pipe.
Still can't help but feel like this remake is missing the tone of the original. If I was in charge of such a project, I'd lean much harder into the crazy action-packed side of System Shock, rather than the very limited horror side. Remaster the original music, try to replicate the original game's enemy count so you're often being chased by like 10 enemies at once, have everything bright, colourful and well-lit (except deck 3 obviously), etc. Make the player constantly aware of the countdown to the station's destruction and encourage them to play frantically and boldly, as in the original, rather than encouraging them to skulk around in the dark taking their time. The station is going to blow up in a few hours, there's no time to stand around being scared by mutants. Increase SHODAN's presence a little and also increase Rebecca Lansing's presence, so she calls you a lot more frequently to give you constant updates on exactly how fucked you are.
SS1 borderlines on the transcendental with the inclusion of cyberspace and its inhabitants that exist within and without (Cortex Reavers). Much like the films "The Lawnmower Man", "Hackers" and "The Matrix".
Yeah, I mean to be clear I'm not saying Doom 3 is just like the originals. I just think it's closer and more inspired by them than people think. I always hear people say it's like a completely different genre and series and I don't think that's true. It takes certain aspects of the originals and emphasizes them more than others.
Ah yeah i agree. Id at the time said that Doom 3 was what they originally wanted Doom to be and while that was largely taken as a marketing speech (especially by those who didn't really see Doom 3 as a "real Doom"), if you read the interviews and articles (and Masters of Doom :-P) of the original Doom developers, you'll notice that several things in Doom 3 were indeed things that they wanted to put in the original Doom (especially some of Tom Hall's ideas, like how you start normally hanging around other marines and then hell breaks loose or how the environments start normal but they become progressively twisted and intertwined with hellish elements as the game goes on).
So I came across this: "After several journalists noted that the System Shock 3 websites had been transferred to ownership under Tencent in May 2020, Otherside confirmed that they had been unable to continue the series as a smaller studio and transferred the licensed rights to Tencent to continue its development,[108] though Spector affirmed that OtherSide is still involved in its development alongside Tencent.""
Thief 1 also excelled in the creation of a horrific atmosphere. Being limited in your ability to fight your way out and the excellent sound design created a vivid illusion of mortal danger. The moaning muffled sound of the zombies, the eerie whispers of those hammerite haunts and the alien sounds of those pagan beasts were brilliant. The slower pace also works better for horror in my opinion. I don't think that any Doom game was especially scary. Gory visuals and jump scares are exciting a few times time but become dull fairly quickly. Doom 3 was probably the worst offender on this front.
How NDS was ghosted by a publisher. From an article about crowdfunding on Wireframe #41:
PUBLISHERS AND PRESSURES
Imagine the stakes for Nightdive Studios, then, whose System Shock remake campaign inhaled $1,350,700 – at least 13 times Battle Chef Brigade’s total. The success took Nightdive utterly by surprise.
“At the time, we were only just a team of developers,” says Stephen Kick, the studio’s founder and CEO. “We didn’t have a community manager. We didn’t have people dedicated to just answering questions about our community.” The number of backers – and the sheer amount of money involved – intensified the stress and its own expectations over the project. “We had, I think, four or five people that donated $10,000. And then we had 10,000 people that donated $35 for a digital copy of the game, and every single one of those people matters regardless of how much they donated. The weight of that hit us all at once.”
Then the publishers came knocking, and the campaign’s immense success swiftly propelled System Shock into the limelight. “It was really exciting for us to have that kind of attention,” says Kick. “Of course, the first things they begin to promise you are that you could build a bigger, better game, your backers are going to be happier, you’re going to make more money, that type of thing.”
By dangling promises of more support and funds if the team could prove it was capable of producing a blockbuster title, the publishers made incremental demands on the System Shock demo, ever-increasing the complexity of managing the project. But the promised funds never came. Nightdive Studios was ghosted by the very publishers that pursued it, who stopped answering emails and ceased all communications, leaving the studio with only empty promises. And this is after Nightdive Studios had ramped up the team to develop a better demo. “They left us with a giant, expensive team to develop a game we didn’t budget for,” Kick recalls.
Having burned through the bulk of funds raised through Kickstarter just from trying to meet these expectations, Kick felt he had to put the project on hiatus to assess its next moves
And as for Nightdive Studios, the team has since resumed development on System Shock – and helped put to rest some of the community’s worries (check out Wireframe #31 for more on the game’s progress). Looking back at the game’s turbulent Kickstarter history, Kick was grateful for the community’s support, some of whom have volunteered to moderate its Discord channel, or even joined the team to aid with development. The thorny publisher issue taught him a valuable lesson, too. “You have to be willing to find a publisher that wants you to work on the game you’re envisioning, and the game you want to make, because as soon as you start compromising, there’s no telling what lengths they’re going to make you go [to],” Kick says. “And at that point you’re on a slippery slope, you could end up burning through your funding to try to appeal to a publisher and end up with no deal.
“I’m just so grateful that our other team at Nightdive was able to release a couple of games during that time, which enabled us to keep everything going,” he continues. “So it could have gone the other way. And at the end of the day, I’m so happy we’re still making this game.”
This month we have decided to dedicate this update to some of SHODAN’s cybernetic children. Recreating each enemy is a joint effort of our artists Robb Waters, Jed Wahl, and Evie Mansell; together they were able to recreate as well as update each one.
Serv-Bot
“This automated research assistant helps with lab chores, transporting equipment, mixing chemicals, recording lab notes, and relaying memos. It has a rudimentary AI and is equipped with improved speech recognition sensors.”
-Catalog of Robotic Assistants on Citadel Station
The Serv-Bot holds true to the original design but it is necessary to conceptualize it as a real-world functioning machine.
Just get a look at those new details and that text crawl!
Repair Bot
“This maintenance automaton performs routine service operations in access corridors involving welding, part replacement, and circuitry repair. An insectoid chassis allows for movement along slanted architectural structures.”
-Catalog of Robotic Assistants on Citadel Station
While much hasn’t strayed from the original design, we have the ability to add extra details that make sense for functionality.
I hope you have your Mini Pistol ready because these little guys won't go easy on you.
Maintenance Bot
“Early Repair-Bot prototypes had trouble accessing Citadel's matrix of crawl-tubes, shafts and cable troughs when making repairs, so the robotics department created the more maneuverable Maintenance-Bot. Their compact tooling devices are specifically designed for limited access areas and double as defensive attachments.”
-Catalog of Robotic Assistants on Citadel Station
Now we start to move on to the bots that have much bigger changes. In concepting a modern Citadel, some enemies just needed to be a bit more practical. These natural changes are a little closer to what you see in System Shock 2.
Between decals, wires, and each modular segment, there is so much detail!
Mobile Laser
“Designed for laser welding and cutting, the Hopper works in coordination with Repair-Bots for major repair jobs. They follow computer-assigned tasks and employ a powerful laser torch. Their low-level diagnostic capabilities allow them to identify potential mechanical breakdowns and report them to the central maintenance hub.”
~ Catalog of Robotic Assistants on Citadel Station
What? The Hopper is evolving?
Congratulations, your Hopper is now a Mobile Laser! Jokes aside, in updating the mobile laser we had to think about the practicality of it being on the station. However, we made sure its name was there.
As you can see in this turnaround, the majority of the changes were to the base, but other than that it is very close to the original!
Mantis Assassin
The Mantis Assassin is a newer enemy based on the Cyborg Assassin. Unlike the regular Assassin, this version likes to get up close and personal with its targets. One precisely landed piercing blade to the throat will silence any insect.
Watch out for the cybernetic tibial, or you just might get stabbed.
Cyborg Enforcer
These Cyborgs are converted female members of the crew and are easily recognized by their brown armor, mechanized legs, and green visor in the original.
Well, that arm looks familiar, seems like SHODAN is borrowing parts from the Maintenance Bot.
As you can see, she is made to be very unique and modular.
Virus Mutant
Lastly, something truly organic…
The Virus Mutant is kept very true to the original vision, which truly makes him new and horrible is his pus-filled attacks.
I guarantee that you'll want to take him out as quickly as possible.
One last thing....
Cyberspace coming soon.
Realms Deep
3D Realms presents Realms Deep 2020, an event honoring indie games unlike any other!
"Love indie old-school-inspired shooters? Watch Realms Deep for world premieres from 3D Realms and 1C Entertainment, including a brand new dark-fantasy FPS and multiple new games. But 3D Realms won’t hog the spotlight. Expect news from all, and game reveals from some of the genre’s biggest names including New Blood Interactive (DUSK, Amid Evil, Gloomwood, ULTRAKILL), NightDive Studios (System Shock, DOOM 64, Turok remasters), Running with Scissors (the POSTAL series) and many, many more. More than 40 games in all!"
"Its been so long Ive since moved twice now and the card I used to purchase had expired. Hopefully this gets released within the next 2 years. Might have kids by then."
He'd need to find a woman willing to touch him first.
