I've played many games carrying the System Shock DNA - games like Deus Ex, System Shock 2, and newer games following the 'immersive sim' design ethos. Even having a good idea of what to expect from SS1 and having played newer games that for many improved upon the design of SS1, I still had a blast with this game in 2017. The Enhanced Edition makes it just accessible enough so that even with a few minor annoyances, after a couple sessions of play I was used to the interface/controls. I'll just say what impressed and surprised me most about this game, being a first time player in 2017 (I was too enamored with Doom in the early 90s to notice this System Shock's release). Here is a game that does not insult your intelligence - there are no objective markers except the ones you leave for yourself in your maps. There are not even explicit "objectives", there is a game world with problems that you can choose to solve as you uncover the information and the tools to do so. And somehow you get just enough of each as you progress, so that your progression feels natural, but also earned, since you are afforded such freedom without being directly guided. I can see how this could frustrate a lot of players, but for the game-literate, this is a design dream come true, a near perfect marriage of designer direction and player freedom in the semi-linear game space. No one would be brave (or stupid?) enough to do something like this now, and it WORKS. Of course, there are flaws. Some activities like combat on revisited floors become annoying in the later game, and the interface isn't bad because it's old, it's just not a good design. Some voice acting is very amateur. The environments are unique but also fairly ugly and often don't reflect their in-world purpose clearly. All that said, System Shock is an 8/10 game. In 2017! The fact it came out in 1994 really makes it a miracle. Don't miss it if you are looking for a textbook "classic". (no significant stability issues on Win7)
Over the years, the Deus Ex approach to game design has lost out. While the game still has the player chasing objectives, the sheer breadth of choice in how they are tackled and how you act on that particular objective has not been matched often (and certainly not by its new prequel, Human Revolution). Arguably, this depth is only really appreciated on second, third, or further playthroughs of the game. The common line that you'll always discover something new is no lie. The game is in fact deeply flawed, with combat that feels clunky, bad voice acting and terrible graphics (among other problems) but it ultimately succeeds on so many levels as a pure game experience because of its character customization, strong narrative drive, and the aforementioned depth of choice in how to move forward. What most reviewers and publicity of this game fail to mention, however, and what gripped me the most when I first played this game, is the philosophy this game is built upon. Relevant now more than ever in its grim predictions (to the point of even blaming the absence in New York of the World Trade Center towers on terrorist attacks, BEFORE that attack even took place), the game deals in the politics of corruption, greed, and it deals in the philosophies of power, ethics, and the inevitable paradigm shift that new and revolutionary technologies impose upon all of these things. If you take the time to read the public terminals, read the newspapers lying around in-game hotel rooms, listen to the complaints of the bums on the street, etc, you really get not just a depth of gameplay but also a depth of political motivation and inspiration. The developers were clearly well-read. This all lends to a feeling of truly being a part of something HUGE, and scarily real, while playing. Games this smart don't come along often, and it's sad how dumbed-down the actual intellectual content of new titles can be (once again as example, prequel Human Revolution has completely watered down its intellectual content as well to be comprehensible to any audience). In today's world it seems as if the Deus Ex events are coming true - freedoms removed in the name of "security," technological advances that allow extreme degrees of control, grey moral ground that never seems clear. And you get all this in a sci-fi game world that still looks like the world we know today, not some far-removed cloud city with flying cars. You have an amazing game experience, and if you're not particularly politically aware you will learn something too. For $10 you'd be stupid to miss it. This is the gold standard that games born on the PC must always compare themselves to.
