System Shock is the godfather of the immersive sim genre. The game has inspired many predecessors that have gone on to further the genre and bring it into the limelight. Immersive sims by definition are wide-open sandboxes that allow players to approach any situation how they see fit. Games that come to mind when thinking about this expansive genre are Bioshock, Deus Ex, and the 2017 Prey. These later games do a great job of guiding players and directing them where they need to go without ever being intrusive. But the game that inspired it all, System Shock, takes a very hands-off approach to game design and forces players to pay attention and even take notes on the locations of specific terminals, rooms, and much more.
In this guide, we are going to go over some tips and tricks that we think everyone should know about going into the game. There won’t be any spoilers here!
Embrace the Confusion
First, do not be afraid to explore. As you travel through the space station, the mapping function that your character has installed will begin to fill out the map for you and denote special rooms you may come across. There are going to be many times throughout the game when you’ll be on a floor in the space station and need an item from one way above you. Piecing that together is a part of the fun.
Don’t Focus on Clearing a Whole Floor
Exploring is everything! But also knowing when you need to move on is important. The game doesn’t expect you to arrive on a floor and have all of the tools needed to go and clear every room. There are many different ways to approach the obstacles and puzzles that the game has thrown at you on each floor! So maybe you will clear a whole floor out due to your innate genius.
Pick Up Enemy Guns!
Whenever you defeat enemies they are more than likely going to drop a gun. Now, you probably have a gun in your inventory already and have been using it readily. If you pick up enemies’ guns you can eject the ammo from them and use them in yours AND then you can recycle them for credits.
Reduce, Vaporize, and Recycle
There is a lot of stuff in the space station that you can get your hands on, some of it is good and some of it has the (junk) tag which means it has no use outside of being vaporized. Vaporizing is going to be the best way to get scrap for you but also it will clear out space in your inventory!
Acquire a Sparqbeam
Starting out in the game you’ll have your handy wrench and then eventually you will get your hands on a mini-pistol which is great at shooting ballistics at enemies. Most of the enemies you encounter at the start are going to be zombies which are easy to dispatch with a wrench but slowly you’ll start fighting crazier things like robots and androids. The androids you will encounter will be shooting electricity at you and once they get killed, you can grab their gun which is called a Sparqbeam. What makes a Sparqbeam great is it shoots electricity (which is good against robots), but it also recharges its ammo over time. The mini-pistol can run out of bullets but the Sparqbeam will be there no matter what.
Don’t Forget To Lean
System Shock has you exploring through hallways with blind spots in them constantly. Every floor of the space station has enemies looking to take you down, traps around every corner, and even cameras spying on you all the time. What leaning allows you to do though is look around a corner and make sure it’s safe. There are countless times in a System Shock playthrough where you can just turn a corner and get killed in one hit. Looking with the Q and E keys doesn’t put your hitbox in sight of whatever is lurking around the corner.
Do you have any tips and tricks we should know about? Comment below and tell us!
