Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 days ago
System Shock is a classic. It innovated within the first-person adventure genre and crafted an extraordinary world in which the horrors of a dystopian, ultra-capitalist future were felt viscerally by players wandering through the dark and terrifying corridors of Citadel Station. A game of that caliber naturally needed a sequel, and five years later, in 1999, it got one. For the purposes of this video, I'm using the version downloaded by default when installing the game through GOG..
When you launch the game, you pass through the mandatory company logo videos before arriving at the main menu, which has been styled to resemble a Star Trek-esque computer interface. Most of what you'll find there is fairly standard for the era — you can view the credits, watch the game's intro, and, most importantly, dig into the options.
The first page you land on is something the original System Shock notably lacked: a full control settings tab. Not only can you rebind every key the game uses, but you can also configure basic settings like mouse sensitivity and whether vertical mouse movement is inverted. The second tab handles graphics, which is admittedly limited — you can't adjust graphical detail settings, only the resolution. Fortunately, there are plenty of options to choose from, including modern widescreen resolutions. The third tab covers audio, including a toggle for hardware acceleration if you happen to have compatible hardware or have installed a software emulator. You can even enable EAX, which the game uses to simulate reverb and echo within environments. One limitation is that volume control is restricted to master volume and music volume, though that's still an improvement over a single master slider. The final tab is the difficulty selection, somewhat oddly placed within the options menu rather than at the point of starting a new game. Unlike the original System Shock's granular difficulty system, System Shock 2 simply offers four general categories — Easy, Normal, Hard, and Impossible — with no explanation of what each actually changes within the game...
System Shock is a classic. It innovated within the first-person adventure genre and crafted an extraordinary world in which the horrors of a dystopian, ultra-capitalist future were felt viscerally by players wandering through the dark and terrifying corridors of Citadel Station. A game of that caliber naturally needed a sequel, and five years later, in 1999, it got one. For the purposes of this video, I'm using the version downloaded by default when installing the game through GOG..
When you launch the game, you pass through the mandatory company logo videos before arriving at the main menu, which has been styled to resemble a Star Trek-esque computer interface. Most of what you'll find there is fairly standard for the era — you can view the credits, watch the game's intro, and, most importantly, dig into the options.
The first page you land on is something the original System Shock notably lacked: a full control settings tab. Not only can you rebind every key the game uses, but you can also configure basic settings like mouse sensitivity and whether vertical mouse movement is inverted. The second tab handles graphics, which is admittedly limited — you can't adjust graphical detail settings, only the resolution. Fortunately, there are plenty of options to choose from, including modern widescreen resolutions. The third tab covers audio, including a toggle for hardware acceleration if you happen to have compatible hardware or have installed a software emulator. You can even enable EAX, which the game uses to simulate reverb and echo within environments. One limitation is that volume control is restricted to master volume and music volume, though that's still an improvement over a single master slider. The final tab is the difficulty selection, somewhat oddly placed within the options menu rather than at the point of starting a new game. Unlike the original System Shock's granular difficulty system, System Shock 2 simply offers four general categories — Easy, Normal, Hard, and Impossible — with no explanation of what each actually changes within the game...
