Kick’s words here tie back to what makes Nightdive something of an anomaly that commitment to going the extra mile in both making classic games accessible for modern audiences, and also ensuring the overall mood, tone and feel of any given project is left intact. And that was one of the main reasons that we took that first hiatus a number of years ago is because I feel like we had strayed too far from what made System Shock what it was, and more importantly, how it influenced other games.” “When you're dealing with a franchise that has this kind of significance,” Kick says, “you're very careful about what you do. The remake was delayed multiple times, with development often halting so the studio could take stock and revisit the drawing board. You might be aware that bringing System Shock to market wasn’t easy. She was that important.” Kick went on to explain that Brosius accepted the role “without hesitation,” additionally bringing the original’s sound designer Eric Brosius on board to recreate SHODAN’s iconic glitchy computerized speech pattern. “From the very, very beginning,” says Kick, “we had decided that if we couldn't get Terri Brosius to reprise her role of SHODAN that we weren't even going to bother with this. Once more, we have an area that Nightdive went the extra mile to get right. That uncaring, sinister mood is brought to the forefront by System Shock’s rogue AI antagonist, SHODAN. It’s not wholly unlike Doom 3’s approach to atmosphere, albeit trading cheap jumpscares for a mutant-ridden space station that’s already fallen into chaos and disarray. Its low-res textures blend surprisingly well with Citadel Station’s moody neon lighting a sharp cyberpunk injection helps its cold, dark corridors feel dangerously alive. And I think we've achieved that.”Ģ023’s System Shock certainly has a standout aesthetic. That you are playing something that's important, that's different, and that has historical significance. “We wanted you to be aware that you are playing a classic game. “Our decisions about the art style were very deliberate,” Kuperman explains. But Nightdive was adamant on retaining that classic look and feel. Side by side, the remake is a night-and-day upgrade over the Looking Glass-developed original. While indeed using the 1994 original as a template, it’s the studio’s first attempt at a from-the-ground-up remake with completely new textures, lighting and mechanics. Deep diveĪll this experience leads us to Nightdive’s biggest project to date: the System Shock remake. The release was such a success that Kick was able to found Nightdive off the back of it. ![]() There’s something wrong here.” It turns out that the rights to the System Shock franchise were with a US-based insurance company that, thankfully, was keen to work with Kick in bringing System Shock 2 to GOG. “It’s widely considered to be one of the best PC games of all time. “Like, what happened to this game?” Kick said in an interview with YouTube documentary channel Noclip. Worse still, the game wasn’t easily playable on modern hardware, absent from online storefronts like Steam and GOG. During a vacation, Kick was dismayed to find that his CD-ROM copy of System Shock 2 wouldn’t run on his Chromebook. For context, Kick was a character artist at Sony Online Entertainment, working on games like Planetside 2. ![]() The creation of the System Shock remake feels like Nightdive Studios coming full circle. “We are focused on restoration of classic games, and I don't think that there is any company that would be as aware of the weight of history behind System Shock and the importance of it as we are.” “I think it bears repeating, but Nightdive studios was founded off the back of Steve getting the publishing rights to System Shock 2,” says Larry Kuperman, Nightdive Studios’ director of business development. That is, until you learn about the studio’s humble origins, and its founding by CEO Stephen Kick. The developer is known for a string of high-quality remasters on both PC and console, but a full-blown remake might seem to be a little out of its wheelhouse at first glance.
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