SSR: System Shock Kickstarter

[67462c0c1ab50ZylonBane]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLU2igJ8_jw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQmGBAN3Z5k

[67462c0c1acfeGawain]

Found the gas grenade in armory. It is unusable.
I couldn't get security below 18%

[67462c0c1aed4la0s]

I know the Vidyabox says "it's pre-Alpha don't complain" but the textures are so bad, the whole retro-pixelation look is so wrong. Shock was pretty cutting edge back then, if we are talking about being faithful.

[67462c0c1b085Nameless Voice]

Most of the textures look okay, but the faces of corpses?  Those look absolutely terrible.

[67462c0c1b22bGawain]

It's funny that they say they are using physically based rendering, but then their textures (variables for pbr calculations) are not physically based (real world).
Question for NightDive devs: What is the point of using PB formulas if you don't want realistic results?

I bet the answer is: its new (not really) and fancy and cool to say in kickstarter.

Custom made lighting model would propably be faster to render, faster to develop and easier to get wanted results.
PBR is not very artistic.

[67462c0c1b448Synaesthesia]

>PBR is not very artistic.

Uhh, what? PBR is a system of rules that artists can choose to utilize or break as they see fit. There's nothing artistic or unartistic about it. UE4 (and most other modern engines/renderers) utilizes physically-based rendering, there's generally no way around it. It's like saying "specular/glossiness in the PS3 era isn't artistic."

[67462c0c1b63fGawain]

You are right. I should have said what I mean better.

PBR can be very restricting.

But that is a choice you need to make when making a game.
Usually when choosing PBR you want the game to look hyper realistic.

This remake doesn't look realistic and it isn't trying to?

I just find it funny to use that as a selling point, but when you look at the game it tries to be very distinguishable.
Why not go all the way and try some other distribution and radiance formulas?

[67462c0c1b88eedx]

Hey Everyone,

Hotfix 2 is available now for System Shock Demo which fixes the following issues:

1) Performance Issues are largely dealt with in many areas,
2) Fixed a typo on the status screens.

Thank you for playing the Demo!

Thanks,
Daniel G
Night Dive Studios Producer

[67462c0c1ba6cicemann]

I guess I could spare some time to do a quick video. I'll download and have a play later, then put up the video.

[67462c0c1bd61icemann]

And to double post. Had a play, and recorded my impressions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTTWO6RoTUs

(if your seeing a grey image, give it some time to process as it's a 5GB video).

Pros:

* Nice music. When you actually hear any.
* I really enjoy the puzzles. Requires some thinking, though not super complicated.
* The new areas added in + new little bits to existing rooms is a welcome change.

Neutral:

* With the use of the old audio logs (for now I'm assuming), you can hear in many of them the original sound effects for weapons and enemies, which clashes with the audio of the game itself.
* The enemies appear to have randomized health, as some took 3 hits, some took 5 and some took 2.

Cons:

* At the main menu it says to press any key to continue, but if you press nothing and wait long enough it goes in-game by itself.
* The framerate is terrible. Makes the game almost unplayable.
* Too much ambiance rather than use of music. Game needs wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy more music. Makes the game feel like Doom 3.
* The textures on the walls are way too pixelated up close. To give a comparison, System Shock 2 via SHTUP has more detailed textures. It's clearest when you get up close and look at the tech screens.
* Clicking the number keys on your keyboard for med items (the med patches and first aid kits) uses the item but does not give you the health restoration, where as if you go into your inventory, right-click then select use then it works fine.
* Can't reload weapons, and can't adjust the settings on the sparq.
* You don't see the dots on the mini-map for the cameras and cpu cores.
* No cyberspace

[67462c0c1c4e2RocketMan]

Yep you got it.  I myself probably would not pick on cyberspace, reload, etc just because I know the reason is because they wanted to release something now so... I can look away from that.

When it comes to stuff that can't be excused so easily my main gripes were:

If you're going to have a cool medbed animation don't have the hacker wandering around outside it.  It's really stupid.  If the hacker clicks on the bed, have a 1 second anim where he jumps inside, 1 sec for the thing to shut, 1 sec for green blinkenlights and 1 second to spring out.  Or... just have it blink like it did in SS1 and have insta-health.

The textures are just weird.  High def or retro-pixelated.  Pick 1.  Having this hybrid of the 2 looks like a modern game that was released pre-pre-alpha.  Especially since the performance is so horrendously bad (I thought I was the only one).  My graphics card isn't the best but R9 270X should be able to handle this game no problem.  If it can't, it definitely should.  There's no reason to cut out a gaming rig of that HP level for a game like SS1 with those mishmashed graphics.

Puzzles were indeed great.  Aesthetic is good.

I don't care for the creative liberties.  Not because they're different.  Just because they're worse than what they are replacing.  Every prop in the game seems to deviate from what it's supposed to be and for no other reason than, "we can".  That's fine since they said it's not supposed to be the same game but it just makes me wish I was playing SS1 instead.

The whole game seems blurry or something, like I'm looking through a beer glass.  Way too much uberfication of the atmosphere (literally).

Force bridges and force doors are really cool. 

The surgeon, which didn't need to be added to the game, actually looks cool.

Considering the very first playable demo actually had grenades in it (even if they weren't functional) I kind of expected the level to be more finished now.  I get the impression way too much time went into tiny little artistic details and not enough attn went into game mechanics and player ergonomics.  Fighting is awkward, picking things is awkward.  People criticize SS1 for having a horrible interface but I can play that game like the wind, whereas I died twice in this demo screwing around trying to get rid of the interface so I could clobber whatever was killing me.

Destroying stuff isn't very satisfying.  Maybe it's more realistic now but I feel like destroying enemies and world objects is one of those things that requires suspension of disbelief in this particular game because it's system shock.  It feels like the game is bored with itself.

It's hard to tell stuff apart from other stuff.  All sorts of colourful crap on the shelves and I dunno what's pickable without straining to see it all.  Since they changed the patches to look like tiny circle things, I feel like I'm taking an eye test and with all the high contrast colours and fuzzy foggy stuff in my foreground all the time, that gives me a headache.

[67462c0c1c662icemann]

I absolutely HATE the new medbed's. They make no sense at all. How would you even get into it? What if you had a broken leg?

And the wait from when you click use, wait for the animation to play, then wait a few more seconds is just bad. Compare that to right-click instant health regen from the medbed's in the original.

Now that I've seen them, I like the cyborg surgeons as well. I really don't like the cyborg enforcers though. The thing sticking out of their heads just looks bad. Especially if you look at it from the side.

[67462c0c1cd10Chandlermaki]

Especially since the performance is so horrendously bad (I thought I was the only one).  My graphics card isn't the best but R9 270X should be able to handle this game no problem.  If it can't, it definitely should.  There's no reason to cut out a gaming rig of that HP level for a game like SS1 with those mishmashed graphics.

Can confirm it also runs pretty poorly on a Ryzen 7 1700X and GTX 1070, so it's most definitely related to the demo itself.

[67462c0c1ce50RocketMan]

They should just give up trying to do the medbed right.  Instead, replace it with a giant blender with a hole in the bottom so all the hacker mush can fall into one of those cyborg conversion molds.  Then it won't matter what sort of injury you have.  Shouldn't be any trouble falling into a blender.

[67462c0c1d028lgs]

PSA: The ammo swap button is "T".
They fixed soda cans not giving health upon use in recent update.

I mostly agree with everything you guys posted about the demo so far, would just add a few thoughts:
Bashing security cameras was more fun in Unity demo, because they fell on the floor upon being destroyed.
Melee impact blood sfx is ugly.
All patches looks the same - i'm  not color blind, but i have a hard time telling them apart in the inventory.

[67462c0c1d461voodoo47]

The enemies appear to have randomized health, as some took 3 hits, some took 5 and some took 2.

oof, I'd be careful with that, it seems most people hate random health.

[67462c0c1d716icemann]

All patches looks the same - i'm  not color blind, but i have a hard time telling them apart in the inventory.

Yes they do. They all looked the same to me too.

[67462c0c1d9e7JDoran]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLU2igJ8_jw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQmGBAN3Z5k

Thanks, I'll watch them now (I won't try the demo; I don't tend to play demos of games that I know I want, as if they make me want the full game then I hate having to wait for it to come out. Videos don't have that much effect on me).

[67462c0c1db32voodoo47]

the demo did sort of settle after the update, so I was able to play a bit, with whopping 15fps average (A64 X2 6400+ 3GHz, RX560, shaddap it runs SS2 fine). funnily enough, that would be considered acceptable in the early nineties - that's one way of invoking nostalgia, I suppose.

anyway yeah, no major complaints, but that pixelation on some textures needs to go - at first, I thought the game was glitching out.

[67462c0c1e6b7RoSoDude]

The enemies appear to have randomized health, as some took 3 hits, some took 5 and some took 2.

oof, I'd be careful with that, it seems most people hate random health.

I doubt it's randomized health. My first guess is that they've partially recreated the System Shock damage system in which you have a chance to critically hit depending on your weapon's offense value and your enemy's defense value, plus or minus 10% total damage variation.

[67462c0c1ebaeThiefsieFool]

I doubt it's randomized health. My first guess is that they've partially recreated the System Shock damage system in which you have a chance to critically hit depending on your weapon's offense value and your enemy's defense value, plus or minus 10% total damage variation.

Yeah, they definitely have that, though it looks to be simplified to just crit chance per weapon.

[67462c0c1ed0dicemann]

A new KS update is out. Things of interest:

New maintenance bot concept art:

And that's about it. The rest you see in the latest stream they did.

[67462c0c1ee0eZylonBane]

Looks like it's designed for percussive maintenance.

[67462c0c1ef3eRocketMan]

Lol I wasn't going to say it but it doesn't look like it'll be maintaining much, unless you can fix fusion generators the same way I fix my old TV.  Also this thing would be a nightmare on stairs.  Didn't these guys watch RoboCop?