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Everyone you know tells you that this is one of the greatest games ever made. Everyone
you know is a goddamn whore.
Whenever debates on the greatest PC games ever made come up, there are always a few
staple titles mentioned: Civilization, Doom, X-Com, Star Control 2. Some people might try
to show off their old school l33tness and throw in some lesser known, but still great
titles like Ultima Underworld, Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri, and System Shock (all
made by Looking Glass, oddly enough). Then someone who's not l33t themselves but
wants to impress the hardcore crowd will pipe up and say, "don't forget System
Shock's sequel!" (NOT made by Looking Glass, not oddly enough because it
sucks). It's at this point where the debate comes to a screeching halt. It's
also at this point where it's socially acceptable to call that person a crazy mother
fucking cunt.
I Have This Idea See….
 |  | | | | The most overused cliché in sci-fi horror,
leaking steam pipes (if you don't count the whole haunted spaceship thing too). | |
System Shock 2 is the perfect example of a good concept brought down by poor execution,
just like communism. Except communism didn't inflict quite as much suffering upon the
world. The basic premise of the game is this; you're stuck on a haunted space ship
with lots of horrific things that want to kill you. The same idea was behind the original
System Shock, except that instead of a space ship it was a space station, the
enemies were flat square pixels, and performing the slightest movement required clicking
on a paper doll at the top of the screen. Despite this however the game was praised by
gamers for its groundbreaking setting and execution. The best way to describe it was
"Die Hard in space". You were a cybernetic Bruce Willis foiling
the plans of a terrorist A.I. at every turn.
So if the original game managed to deliver a superb gaming experience with crappy
graphics and a clunky interface, then a sequel with full 3D polygons, great use of
lighting, and unbelievable sound would be the most kick ass thing ever, right? It would
take a pretty monumental act of Satan to make it suck. I'm not even sure Roberta
Williams could have pulled it off. However, what the prince of darkness couldn't do,
Irrational Games managed. HOW DO YOU FUCK UP PLAYING A BRUCE WILLIS CYBORG?! It seems that
whenever a great game gets a sequel that doesn't involve the original designers, that
sequel will always suck. Just take a look at Star Control 3. It's a good thing
Irrational redeemed themselves with the excellent Freedom Force, because holy Christ on a
cracker did they take a great concept and fuck it up with insane design decisions.
In a Nutshell
|  | | | | "I know this looks bad officer, but it
wasn't me! He was like this when I got here!" | |
The best way to classify System Shock 2 would be to call it a First Person Shooter with
RPG (Role Playing Game) elements thrown in. There are several skill areas that your
character spends experience points (called "upgrade modules") on in order to
improve them. Unfortunately blending genres isn't always a good idea, and in most
cases blending the fast paced, reflex based action of a FPS with the slow paced, stat
based tinkering of an RPG is like teaming up Arnold Schwarzenegger and Steven Hawking for
an action movie. Wait no, that would actually be pretty cool. In fact if SS2 had you play
Steven Hawking upgrading the systems and weapons of your cyborg wheelchair then it would
have been the best thing ever. If only…
The Butler Did It
The RPG elements are what killed the game, period. There are plenty of other negative
qualities too, but they're just desecrating an already dead corpse; the skill system
is what pulled the actual trigger and left the body out where the scavengers could get at
it. Having stat based skills is fine for a dedicated RPG because everything is abstracted;
you see your avatar swing a sword or launch a fireball and the stats then take over and
determine if you hit, how much damage you did, etc. In a FPS however you're more
immersed in the game world; you don't issue an order to attack an enemy, you point
the crosshairs at him and pull the trigger yourself, you don't see a number float
above his head to tell how much damage you did, you count the brain fragments exiting the
cranium. That's why horror games are real time, non-abstracted action. They immerse
you into the game world far more than any turn based strategy RPG could ever hope to, and
immersion is a key element in horror. The totally arbitrary skill system and other flaws
kill the immersion, and with it any chance at a good horror game.
They're Pretty, but can They Fight?
The game starts you off at the beginning of your character's four year military
career. You get to choose one of three branches to enlist in to determine your specialty:
marine (shooty guns), navy (geeky technician and h4xOr), and Psi-Ops (psychic/telekinetic
powers) then choose what posts to take in your first three years to further customize a
class. A lot of people claim that this class idea is great, that you can play through the
game three times and have it be different with each class. First of all, I can't
imagine anyone wanting to suffer through this thing THREE goddamn times. If they did a
modern remake of It's a Wonderful Life then heaven would send Charlie down to
someone contemplating playing SS2 a second time, let alone a third, and show them
how much better their life would be if they had listened to me and never played it in the
first place. Second, all that the branch choices do is start you out with certain skills
one point higher or lower than the other branches; you'll be able to catch up to any
of the other classes within the first half hour. Other than that there is NO difference
between the classes, no exclusive skills to each class, no varying plots, nothing. The
only thing the classes do is take up 15 minutes of your time choosing them before you get
to the actual game. This builds tension for the horror to come. Not the horror of scary
zombies but of having to trudge through this game. That's like having to spend an
hour watching the executioner smile at you while he sharpens his axe. Just hurry up and
get it over with you cruel bastards
Now once the actual game starts is where the arbitrary and intrusive nature of the
skill system really shines through. There are skills for different weapon categories. If
you don't have the appropriate weapon skill you cannot fire that weapon, and I
don't mean you can't fire it effectively in a "oops I didn't
know it was loaded" kind of way, you can't fire it at all. You can't
even equip it and brandish it at a monster and try to bluff it into thinking you know how
to use it. There are some complicated heavy weapons in the game like a rocket/grenade
launcher and fusion cannon, but EVERY weapon is subject to your character's utter
incompetence in firearms. It's entirely possible to start off with a standard weapon
skill of zero, which means your character cannot fire a simple pistol. It's even
possible to choose the gung-ho marine class and lack the skill to handle anything more
than a pistol; a pump action shotgun is beyond him. Your character has been in the
military for three YEARS at this point, when were they going to get around to teaching him
how to use an icky gun? Could it be he doesn't know how to load it? Nope, it lets me
load clips into guns I can't use. I guess he needs all those advanced upgrade modules
to figure out how to take the safety off. If your character is supposed to be a
futuristic, state of the art military cyborg, I'd hate to see what army regulars look
like.
I have a friend in the national guard; his job is to maintain computer networks and he
wouldn't see combat if Iraq was invading the White House after China and North
Korea's surprise nuclear strike, but even he has been trained in over half a dozen
types of firearms. Hell last week I went to a shooting range with him and was able to
figure out how to load and shoot despite never holding a gun before in my life. I even
managed to hit the target most of the time from 30 feet away, and this was with a .375
magnum, not the little old lady mugger-deterring popgun you get in the game. Am I more
badass than a third year marine? According to SS2, it would have taken me four years to
take that first shot, with the magnum rusting and falling apart after the fifth bullet.
What's this about disintegrating guns? Welcome to the worst game design
afterthought ever conceived, courtesy of System Shock 2. In attempt at
"realism", the designers decided to make the weapons degrade with use, and they
ended up with "total bullshit". Every time you fire a weapon in this game, the
quality of the weapon decreases until it hits zero and the weapon breaks. Depending on the
condition of the gun when you find it (usually about to break or already broken), it can
be good for about 10-30 shots. What utterly retarded nonsense is this? You can repair
guns, but that requires you spend lots of points to upgrade your repair skill. Even then
you need disposable (just like the guns themselves) repair kits, and you don't find a
single repair kit until a good 3+ hours into the game. Thanks to this "feature"
you'll get to the point where you run out of working guns before you run out of ammo.
One time I had 4 pistols with 5 clips of ammo, guess what happened? Five minutes later I
had 4 broken pistols and a spare clip full of bullets. At one point I was throwing my
stash of broken guns at enemies in hopes of distracting them away from me. Utterly
ridiculous. I suppose that since giant corporations rule the future in SS2, it only makes
sense to make your military hardware disposable in order to boost sales.
Professor Plum, in the Library, With a Wrench
|  | | | | My Jedi Knight duels with
monkeys. Should I be scared or doubled over with laughter? | |
So because of all this the weapon you'll be using for most of the game is a
wrench. I'm totally serious. A goddamn wrench. It's one of only two weapons in
the game that never degrade, the other being an energy sword that takes a crap load of
experience to use, and by that stage in the game most of the enemies are resistant to
energy weapons anyways. How it is that my laser gun with no moving parts breaks down more
quickly than my wrench that I repeatedly smash into metallic cyborg skulls, I have no
idea.
Since you never find a wrench-launching bazooka in the game, you're limited to
swinging it hand-to-hand at enemies. When are people going to learn that hand-to-hand
combat has never worked and will never work in a FPS? The tactic for
engaging enemies hand-to-hand has been the same in every FPS since Doom:
- Let enemy get close till he stops and winds up to hit you.
- Take a step back.
- Enemy misses.
- Take a step forward and hit enemy right after he whiffs.
- Repeat
|  | | | | This guy is just happy
to see me and wants a hug. Come here ya big lug, great to see you! That big box and health
bar floating above your head really kills any atmosphere though. Why isn't my
suspension of disbelief in this shot? BECAUSE IT'S GONE! | |
There are melee enemies late in the game that are supposed to be super huge and scary
(they were ripped off from the pink bull demons in Doom most likely) that actually end up
being easier than a basic zombie. The zombies swing at you semi-randomly while the big
pink thing swings at you every single time he gets close enough, making it extremely
predictable and exploitable. I think they wanted me to use my anti-personnel rounds on it
so my shotgun would fall apart and the game could laugh at me for putting up with its
crap, but I managed to dispatch each of the one-ton behemoths with my trusty wrench. In
the world of System Shock 2, the plumber is king.
They're All Around Us! (because they're cheating)
The scarcity of working weapons is compounded by the fact that the monsters are
cheating whores that constantly respawn all around you. You can clear out every monster
within a five light year radius and soon enough you'll have one pop through the door
to the room you were just in spouting the same scripted line you've heard
hundreds of times and leaving your ammo/gun/health/patience supply even more desperately
low than it was before. Sometimes you even catch new monsters teleporting out of nowhere
in a flash of light. Hellooooooooooo suspension of disbelief! The spawned enemies
don't even have any health or ammo you can loot off them. Sure that zombie was
shooting at you for five minutes straight with a shotgun, but when you go and search him
it will ALWAYS be broken with one bullet left. I'm guessing this feature was meant to
keep you paranoid and give you the feeling that you're never safe and something could
jump out at you at any second, but all it really does is piss you off. You quickly go from
jumping in fright whenever you encounter an enemy to moaning "AGAIN? Give me a
fucking break!". That right there is pretty much your SS2 experience after the first
few hours, horror replaced with frustration.
From time to time you pick up audio logs left behind by the ship's now dead crew
that give you important clues on how to proceed. When you click to listen to them though
the game keeps going. You'll be in the middle of listening to a log when another
spawned enemy pops through the door next to you. It's like trying to curl up with a
good book on the crapper and having your wife/girlfriend/mother/younger sibling barge in
without knocking EVERY SINGLE TIME.
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