The System Shock remake does something remarkable

polygon.com:

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: You wake up in a futuristic medical bay on an orbital space station with some new cyber implants, only to realize that everyone else is dead. I could be talking about BioShock or Dead Space or even, if you squint, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. But in this case, I’m talking about System Shock, which has been remade by Nightdive Studios. This new version reveals how much video games as a whole owe to the 1994 classic.

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Before I was deeply entrenched in the world of video games as a critic and a journalist, I knew about System Shock, but it wasn’t possible for me to play it. Originally developed by Looking Glass Studios, it was a moderate hit at the time, but not explosively popular like its contemporary Doom. Over time its legacy has grown, explicitly influencing games like the aforementioned BioShock and Dead Space, but also Dishonored, Prey, and Deathloop. It also popularized some narrative techniques that now feel tired, like the general practice of telling your story through audio logs.

I had always wanted to play System Shock, to trace the lines of video game history, but as an older, PC-only game, it was hard to get my hands on. Too long had passed between the game’s release and the present day for System Shock to be accessible, not just in