System Shock 3 - First Art and News

Farflame spotted some concept images and news about System Shock 3:

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The Return of Shodan

Last week, I spoke to Spector again to find out what I could about the game, which is likely a few years away from release. He gave up some basic information about the story, including details of returning characters that will probably be welcomed by fans of the sci-fi action series.

First things first, Spector talked about how Shodan will definitely be a big part of System Shock 3.

"Shodan is the heart and soul of System Shock games," he said. "That's the beauty of System Shock 3; nobody else has Shodan. She'll be at the center of the game, but I also want to put her through some changes.

"Arturo has been working on our version of Shodan, which is going to be interesting and different from what people expect. I expect it will infuriate some people but definitely get people talking."

Shodan — her name is an acronym of Sentient Hyper-Optimized Data Access Network — was the central antagonist in the first two System Shock games. Originally created to service a space station, she is tasked with deleting incriminating files. The player in the original game is a hacker who removes her ethics constraints. This turns out to be a bad move.

Over the course of the two games, Shodan reveals herself to be skilled in manipulating systems and people. Her goal is to annihilate the human race. She taunts and mocks the player. Even in defeat, she finds a way to survive.

"In System Shock 3 I want to explore Shodan's motivations," said Spector. "In the first two games her plan was to destroy humanity because, with the removal of her ethical constraints by the hacker in the first game, she's going insane. But we never explained why she wants to destroy humanity. So we're going to be exploring the idea of a super intelligence and what would motivate a super intelligent AI."

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