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Comment by dfan | Hacker News Reader

I am one of the developers of the original game and I would not want to play it in 2023.

Brief followup to replies: we were all figuring it out as we went along. When you're doing something for the first time, it tends not to be optimal. People here have noted the janky controls in particular. Even for things where we did iterate a lot and were happy with our solution, it was a solution in a 1994 context, where games were punishing and it was sort of a point of honor to not cut players a break. Game design has advanced a lot in the last thirty years. I'm proud of the the part we played in that evolution... but a lot of it happened after 1994.

I have not played the remake so I don't have any comments on it.

Man, this is why I love HN.

Come on dfan, you can't leave us hanging like that. Why would you not want to play it in 2023? We want specifics!

Not parent, but because the control scheme was terrible ? It's a game that was made when advanced on the edge control system like mouse look were not really invented yet for FPS, and its "cyberworld" was horrible. I once got blocked inside a tetris game played in my in-game implant and couldn't figure out how to get back to the main ui, it was way too advanced in ideas for the controls it had. Also the graphics are really showing their age, frankly.

The original is on gog, including an "enhanced" version that improve it vastly, and I love this game with a passion, have been since its release, but it's a horrible game to manipulate in 2023. Given this remake is faithful to the core ideas of the game, and most reviews says so, it's a no brainer which one you should play.

I really wanted to like System Shock but the controls made it unplayable pretty much.

A pity as it was not long at all until “mouse look” was developed by other games, an innovation which would have solved much of System Shocks control problems.

They invented or perfected so many things that were way ahead of their time, from the free world navigation, to the fully configurable difficulty level, to all the world interactions and the implants and ... But alas controls was not in that list, and like you said that game came just a wee bit too early to avoid the pre-quake era control trainwreck of FPS trying to be more complicated than Doom.

Loved it, absolutely unique and infinitely fun, but damn did it need a remake for that alone.

What's your take on the remake? Did they make a good job, have any reservations? Anything missing maybe?

That‘s so cool! Must have been wild to work at Looking Glass – you guys were so innovative!

You should fire it up sometime just to see how quickly the game loads now.

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