Nightdive Studios is teaming with upcoming livestreaming platform Binge.com to bring System Shock, the cult-favorite shooter about a hacker who does battle with a rogue AI aboard a corporate space station, to the small screen.
"I’ve always believed that a live-action adaptation of System Shock would be the perfect medium to retell the harrowing story of Citadel Station and its rogue AI that subjects the crew to unimaginable horror," Nightdive Studios CEO Stephen Kick said. "We’re very excited to see the talented team at Binge bring System Shock to life in horrifyingly real and new ways."
Citadel Station is the setting for the original System Shock, released in 1994. Owned by the Tri-Optimum Corporation, it's controlled by an AI named Shodan who goes renegade when a hacker—that would be you, nice going—removes its ethical restraints during a heist. Bad news quickly follows: Shodan decides it's a god and sets off on a plan to destroy most of humanity and dominate the rest, aided by the former Citadel Station crew, now horrifically mutated and cybernetically enhanced.
Developed by Looking Glass Studios, System Shock wasn't a big hit but it was critically acclaimed and did well enough to warrant a sequel. System Shock 2, the first game developed by Ken Levine's then-new Irrational Games, came out in 1999, and was also a major critical success that failed to sell very well. Looking Glass closed its doors shortly thereafter but Irrational carried on and found much greater success with the formula in the subsequent BioShock games.
Nightdive, which acquired the rights to the series in 2015, is currently working on a remake of the original game and, as far as we know, an "enhanced edition" of System Shock 2; System Shock 3 is also in development but has been having a bit of a rough go, and we haven't heard anything about it since May 2020, when Tencent took over the project from Otherside Entertainment.
System Shock is the second game-based series announced by Binge.com: It's also working on a show based on Ubisoft's dormant Driver series. Binge.com is set to go live sometime in 2022, and more information about its take on System Shock will be revealed "in the coming months." Hopefully that will include confirmation that voice actor Terri Brosius is involved: As we said in an early look at the System Shock reboot, "Terri Brosius is Shodan," and I can't imagine anyone else giving voice to the mad machine.
And now that I'm thinking about it, I want to replay it.
