Something to look forward to: Origin Systems’ 1994 classic System Shock is considered the spiritual predecessor to games like Deus Ex, BioShock, and Cyberpunk 2077. Night Dive’s remake has gone through over six years of troubled development, but last month at GDC they gave attendees an update as the project nears completion.

Night Dive told Windows Central at the 2022 Game Developers Conference that the remake of the original System Shock is mostly finished and in a “pre-beta” state. The PC version has just about all of its content in place, but work on the console versions continues. Night Dive plans a simultaneous release this year across PlayStation, Xbox, and PC. A free demo has been available on Steam, GOG, and the Epic Games Store since last year.

Although Night Dive is rebuilding the game from the ground up, their goal is to balance modern game design sensibilities with faithfulness to the original version. The developer had to reassess the project in 2018 to ensure that faithfulness.

The remake will include a version of the original game alongside the one Night Dive has rebuilt, though there are not further details about this and it isn’t clear whether this is related to the remaster of the game the company released in 2015 under the title System Shock: Enhanced Edition. In any case, players will have some choice as to how to enjoy System Shock.

Night Dive did previously confirm that customers who pre-order the System Shock remake will receive a copy of the upcoming remaster of System Shock 2. The developer intends to release both around the same time. Although you can already get a version of System Shock’s 1999 sequel that’s compatible with modern PCs, Night Dive plans to add VR support to the game along with other improvements.