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Anyone know of games similar to the shock games?
Have you played Bioshock? It is after all a spiritual successor to System Shock. The first one is absolutely great!
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RenKalan: Have you played Bioshock? It is after all a spiritual successor to System Shock. The first one is absolutely great!
Love Bioshock, I have played all the Shock games. I recently played through System Shock 1 for the first time. Loved it. I Know what I'll play, I never got around to playing the burial at sea episodes.
I think you should definitely play Burial at Sea. Great story AND you're back at Rapture!
Other than that, maybe you should try Deus Ex...
Bioshock really isn't very Shock-like at all. It may have a lot of surface similarities, but at heart it's just a dumb barely-adequate FPS.

There's nothing out there that gives SS2's precise mix of action-RPG and survival horror, but Deus Ex and VtM: Bloodlines come close in the action-RPG department, while the Amnesia series offer pretty good first-person survival horror.
There's Iji, a freeware game by Daniel Remar that's often desribed as "System Shock 2D" with some Metroidvania elements. You can upgrade Iji's abilities with nanites found throughout the game, and your actions can impact what happens in the story.

http://www.remar.se/daniel/iji.php
What exactly are you looking for? a with horror elements or a FPS/RPG hybrid?
Well... another spiritual successor for System Shock would be Dead Space. Maybe even more that the mentioned BioShock (although I do love BioSh series... played it before SS2). If you decide to go with Dead Space however, start, obviously, form DS1 and then go to second. I'm not sure if I should recommend the third one however - didn't played it, but they say it's no longer a horror. And... Maybe (I hope so at least) I'm mistaken, but... there a micro-transactions there. For fastening some things, I believe.
I think the key elements that have never really been replicated in a single game since are as following:

- First person exploration and fighting using scarce resources in terrifying solitude
- Addictive character building system that keeps you up at night thinking of builds
- Richly crafted and presented game universe that is worth more than the sum of it's parts, the setting is not generic
- A well made machine antagonist that avoids the usual tedious 'self-aware AI' tropes (much rarer than you were probably thinking before I brought it up)
- Likewise, well made and interesting zombie/hive mind antagonists (first time I heard a monstrous creature cry "I'm sorry" as they took a swing at me is an unforgettable gaming moment)
Although not similar as an RPG with stats, both Thief 1 and Thief 2 use the same engine. If you like stealth at all, you can't go wrong. Most of the control scheme is pretty much the same. The game feels very much like System Shock 2 when playing it.
Deus Ex is as close as it got to a sequel. Ultima Underworld 1 has a similar feel to it; early part of the game feels like a survivor game and it's first-person controls/view. likewise, its unofficial sequel Arx Fatalis.

and then there's The Legacy,but i've never played it myself. it's suppose to be madly hard. plays more like ye old goldbox game but in realtime. your character can even get scared to death. lol.
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/09/05/retro-the-legacy-realm-of-terror/
I was going to suggest an overlooked indie game by the name of Tecno: the Base but the author has pulled the PC version in hopes of doing a mobile version. I've sent him an email in hopes he would reconsider that decision because it really is an overlooked gem that died of zero marketing.

There are a few walkthroughs on Youtube, but here is a spoiler-free trailer.
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Sufyan: I think the key elements that have never really been replicated in a single game since are as following:

- First person exploration and fighting using scarce resources in terrifying solitude
- Addictive character building system that keeps you up at night thinking of builds
- Richly crafted and presented game universe that is worth more than the sum of it's parts, the setting is not generic
- A well made machine antagonist that avoids the usual tedious 'self-aware AI' tropes (much rarer than you were probably thinking before I brought it up)
- Likewise, well made and interesting zombie/hive mind antagonists (first time I heard a monstrous creature cry "I'm sorry" as they took a swing at me is an unforgettable gaming moment)
So you want it to be exactly like ss2?
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Sufyan: I think the key elements that have never really been replicated in a single game since are as following:

- First person exploration and fighting using scarce resources in terrifying solitude
- Addictive character building system that keeps you up at night thinking of builds
- Richly crafted and presented game universe that is worth more than the sum of it's parts, the setting is not generic
- A well made machine antagonist that avoids the usual tedious 'self-aware AI' tropes (much rarer than you were probably thinking before I brought it up)
- Likewise, well made and interesting zombie/hive mind antagonists (first time I heard a monstrous creature cry "I'm sorry" as they took a swing at me is an unforgettable gaming moment)
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Xkilljoy98: So you want it to be exactly like ss2?
This thread is from last summer and you decide to resurrect it to ask me this? I can see how the last two points narrow it down way too much, but I honestly only brought them up as good points that characterise SS2, not that they must both be in a similar game to compare. You could combine the two points into "Good antagonists".

So, I can't think of any game that has you scrounging for resources with an engaging character building system, set in a rich universe with a small setting, with great and interesting antagonists. The game has some design elements that just resonate well and rather uniquely. No other game to my memory feels this way.
I see 2 games that could work :

- First one is actually STALKER :
Rare resources, especially the first STALKER.
No character building system, but since you can only carry that much, your equipment will basically tell you what you can do
Richly crafted and presented game universe that is worth more than the sum of its part
A well-made non-machine, not-sure-if-sentient antagonist that avoid any trope you can think of
Interesting enemies, from human groups that work in group to interesting zombies [both "real zombies" and mental controlled cult]
The second episode is so-so, but the first episode is great and the last episode is one of my favorite games ever.

- Way less known- Robinson Requiem
Incredibly scarce resources...
Not really a character building system but equipment instead
Interesting game universe, though not perfect.
No central antagonists, but plenty of smaller "intelligent" one.
It adds two things : crippling ethics decision [and not Baldur's Gate "save the puppy, or kill it". More like This War of Mine level of decision : kill an nice guy and survive, or don't kill him and most probably die]
Horrible UI, just like SS1
Incredibly difficult. I mean, not "very difficult", not "a long time to get into the game," not "You can just save-scum", but "incredibly punishing and hard" - which is the reason why being a nice guy along the whole game is basically suicidal.
Post edited April 25, 2016 by Narwhal.644