Looking Glass Studios Retrospective 3/3 (System Shock 2, Thief II: The Metal Age, Legacy)

[@hemangchauhan2864]

Now this was a wonderful video. Really great editing, man! This video is a must watch for those who appreciate gaming, or want to appreciate the legacy the studio left. Mad respect for you. Looking forward to your next videos!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Hemang Chauhan Wow, thanks for the high praise! I have always really respected this studio and what came after it, and have wanted to do a retrospective of it and Ion Storm for a while now. System Shock and its sequel are some of the most atmospheric and immersive games I've played. Along with Thief and Underworld they stand as true classics today.

[@hemangchauhan2864]

Indigo Gaming I don't know much about Ion Storm expect Deus, Daikatana, and their weird western JRPG. Would love a video on that one.

[@GreedAndSelfishness]

Its mindblowing how much these games influenced gaming. They set the standards. Truly innovative bunch. I struggle to see any other studio to compare them to.

[@intuitivedruid5732]

I cannot wait to play System Shock Remake!

[@MiguelBaptista1981]

Great video. Short, insightful, rewatchable many times. Keep it up!

[@Bazztoner]

I almost cried in the "Closing" part of the video. Thanks for making these!

[@dragon95os]

I did cry .. literally !

[@LupusAries]

@@dragon95os Made me feel rather das as I Loved Flight Unlimited I and II and didn't buy III because I didn't have the PC to run it. Later Player Thief and that was an eye-opener. As for Flight Unlimited the Trouble was that in one hand they we're Up against giants like Microsoft and Sierra, and on the other hand there was what we in the community call the big Flight Sim Crash of 2000. The problem was that there was too much competition, too many flight sims out in too short a time, and a lot of them lost out. Most of them were Combat Flight sims though, which is what I mostly played with a bit of bush-flying and the like in Flight Unlimited. FU had an approach that was a bit unusual for a Civilian Flight simulation, in that it did focus on a certain area, and rendered that in high detail, more like a Combat Flight simulator and quite unlike say Microsoft Flight Simulator. The latter had the whole world to fly in, but safe for some landmarks, a new much touted feature in MSFS 98 (which also was compatible with the Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator), the world was mostly barren. However the MSFS allowed third parties (originally modders) to make addon territories and aircraft, something which could not be done in Flight Unlimited. At the time both the graphics and the Flight Physics in Flight Unlimited were superior to the Microsoft Flight Simulator at the time, the difference between MSFS 98 and both Flight Unlimited II and III it's contemporaries was staggering. FU II: www.oldpcgaming.net/flight-unlimited-2-review/ FUIII: www.oldpcgaming.net/flight-unlimited-3/ MSFS 98: www.oldpcgaming.net/microsoft-flight-simulator-98-review/ Pro Pilot: www.oldpcgaming.net/pro-pilot-98-review/ Another groundbreaking feature in Flight Unlimited that only much later came to other civilian flight sims were missions, which were certain story-based scenarios where your flying skills wre tested, some representing everyday aviation and some straight out of a thriller novelists mind.......like one in FU II where you had break out someone from Alcatraz. That mission involved flying Like Pro Pilot, it also had a flight school where you could learn the basics of flying, hell even with voiceovers for the instructions. ;) But at the Same time, Sierra had released Pro Pilot in 1998, Fly! was released by GoD (Gathering of Devlopers! ;) another great publisher) and Laminar Research released 3 Versions of X-Plane and that is just the civilian side alone. A post I recently made on a Frooglesim news video on the new Microsoft Flight simulator 2020, shows the oversupply quite well....(yeah it took me a good two hours to compile and verify that list, so I'm not going to type it twice! ;) ) "So in the year 2000 we had: Previous releases Falcon 1998 Jane's F-15 1998 Jane's F/A-18 1999 Jane's WW2 Fighters 1998 Jane's USAF 1999 Jane's Fighters Anthology 1997 Jane's Longbow 2 1997 Luftwaffe Commander 1999 European Air War 1998 MS Combat Flight simulator 1998 Air Warrior III 1997 Warbirds 1998 Fighter Squadron: Screaming Demons over Europe 1999 Warbirds II 1999 Nations WW2 Fighter Command 1999 (Never had heard of that) Flight Unlimited II 1997 Flight Unlimited III 1999 Sierra Pro Pilot 1998 Commanche III/Gold 1997 Enemy Engaged: Apache vs. Havoc 1998 F-22 Air Dominance Fighter 1997 F-22 ADF Red Sea operations 1998 Total Air War 1998 F-16 Agressor 1999 F-18 3.0 1997 F-18 Korea 1997 Mig Alley 1999 Mig-29 Fulcrum 1998 (Novalogic) F-16 Fight Falcon 1998 (Novalogic) Red Baron II 1997 F-22 Lightning 3 (Novalogic) 1999 iF-22 (imagic) 1997 Flanker 2.0 1999 Jet Fighter III MSFS 98 F-16 Fighting Falcon (Digital Integration) Fly! (1999) X-Plane V3 1997 X-Plane V4 1998 X-Plane V5 1999 And then we had the releases of the Year 2000 Rowan's Battle of Britain MS Combat Flight simulator 2 MS Flight simulator 2000 Ka-52 Team Alligator (Follow up to Team Apache) I left out all the 1995 and 1996 released, of which there are many, including the famous Hind. " Hell I did not even know some of those sims, and I've been a Flight simmer for more than 20 years now. Found a lot of them here: www.oldpcgaming.net/simulator/ As google sometimes doesn't even find the stuff that I remember, ok most of that predates google. Why do I say oversupply? Well that has to do with the rather longform content that is Flight Simulations, it takes dozens of hours to get into, tens of hours to learn how to fly each aircraft and you can play them for years without getting bored. So the ammount of sims you can play per year is limited, I think you could play at may three to four a year in total, even as a teenager, especially with a limited bugdet on pocket money and games were expensive, never mind the flight sticks. (though those were actually cheaper than today.)

[@GamingKeenBeaner]

I was in the process of getting a job with Looking Glass when they shut down. I am so glad I didn't move all the way from Iowa to the Bay Area just to end up with no job. It was my dream at the time to work for them because they were such legends, but in many ways I just didn't see at the time how dysfunctional they were as a company. Looking Glass is one of those companies like Obsidian that took other people's franchises and made them way better. How much better would the world of games be if they had just focused more on their core franchises and not been so distracted with titles that nobody remembers now. The Underworld games were mind-blowing for their time especially, and its hard to understate how impressive they were for such small teams developing them. If only they had not laid off Spector and if only they had never allowed themselves to become so dependent on a publisher.

[@KidsWreckMovies]

Thanks for this video-series. I recently replayed thief 1 and 2 and after that system shock 2 and I just can't get over the fact that these games still grab me like they did the first time!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Kidswreckmovies Yeah they still have the magic that they did so many years ago.

[@Krystalmyth]

They would if I could run them hehe... Thankfully the fans have really stepped in to keep these games alive.

[@jamesmolloy6839]

The writing and presentation in this documentary is fantastic. Hopefully the KZbin algorithm picks up on these videos at some point and it gets a bump in viewership.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks, I appreciate that. I think this trilogy is probably past it's prime and KZbin's algorithm is a fickle mistress so it's unlikely. There are some sound issues in these videos, so I have planned for a while to re-release the set in one remastered video sometime, though.

[@MDUmairKh]

There might never be a studio as talented as Looking Glass Studios again, a company where every person was a multi talented genius. Eric Brosius, Steve Pearsell, Paul Neurath, Ramin Djawadi, Kemal, Terri Brosius, Warren Spector, Randy Smith etc etc etc. Every time when I think about their fate, I want to cry hard. This just shows why developers these days chase Call of Duty audience, because well made games are not respected by most people until it's too late. Same is the case with movies, where movies like Transformers sell like hot cakes and movies like Interstellar under-perform. Casuals ruin everything.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Umair Khan I hear ya. It seemed like their most innovative games were some of their least financially successful. As much as their closing sucked, we've seen their philosophy spread and you could argue that games like Deus Ex, Dishonored and Bioshock were all made possible by planting those inspirational seeds into other companies. So there was good and bad about it.

[@MDUmairKh]

Indigo Gaming Yes it's true that Origin, Looking Glass and Ion Storm had huge impact on game industry and even today people look back and take inspiration from their games but there was something special about those games. Despite being visually outdated, it's so easy loose yourself into the world of Thief and System Shock. Bioshock and Dishonored are both decent games but you can see that both of them were streamlined for wider audiences. Even Ken Levine himself said that publishers force devs to streamline their games for more profit in modern industry. Arkane's upcoming Prey sounds great though and it's inspired by System Shock. And then there is also System Shock 3 from original developers at OtherSide Entertainment. And since they are independent, I've faith in that project. Let's hope that Night Dive Studio won't force them to streamline the game. The Remake of original looks faithful though.

[@kamas74able]

abolutly true umair

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+TimtheEnchanter All great developers. I do want to cover Bullfrog and Troika very much some day, possibly Westwood too.

[@MDUmairKh]

Indigo Gaming I'd love to see documentary about Troika Games. Such a talented developer. Vampire is one of the bestest RPGs I've ever played. You should try GOG release. It comes with basic version of Wesp5 patch (already implemented). Fixes bugs and shit. Minor issues are still there but 95% of the game works great. It was in pretty bad shape on release because Activision pulled the plug.

[@Torgo1969]

Great series of vids. I'm happy to say that I didn't play Thief TDP until Nov 1999 then The Metal Age came out just a few months later. Truly brilliant people at LGS! I even made a pilgrimage to 100 Cambridgepark Drive to pay homage. And to try to lockpick my way in!

[@Crazy_Borg]

I still love the interface of System Shock 2 where you can switch between shooting and an inventory/stats/messages screen smoothly by pressing a button. You could move around while managing your inventory or looking through your audio logs for example, it was brilliant. Sadly no other games used such a system afterwards.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Good point. Games like the original Deus Ex and System Shock 2 were some of the last 1st person games to not have a streamlined and console-ized interface. I did enjoy the "multi-tasking" you could do in SS2, and it was pretty revolutionary in the original to be able to listen to audio logs and get story and background while you were playing, instead of stopping the game to sit you down for story-time for a few minutes, interrupting the flow of gameplay. It was really ahead of its time.

[@xNecroNvRDiesx]

Gotta say, I really did not expect to actually burst at those little clips of the workers on their last day but here we are I guess lmao. Incredible series though! Super informative & interesting. Love the channel

[@tom.looman]

What a great series! Thank you for taking the time to make this. Very insightful.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks Tom, I appreciate it!

[@locolama]

6:54 And this is why I subscribed to your channel after stumbling upon it by accident while browsing YT for videos related to immersive-sims. After playing Thief 2 for so many times I've always wondered how they did all these cool videos in the original Thief games, and you explained it to me in 13 seconds. Also seeing these developers speak about how they felt about loosing their job was one of the best pieces of video-game related media I've ever seen. When studios like Looking Glass or Black Isle were shutting down was truly the end of an era in video game history. Also, the production design value of your videos is magnificent for a one man job. Keep up the good work, and please excuse me for my poor english skills, I'm not a native speaker.

[@albedoshader]

I still own original copies of System Shock (on 3.5" floppy disks), System Shock 2, Flight unlimited (which was an awesome flight simulator) and Flight Unlimited III, which also was great fun. Looking Glass was an amazing game studio.

[@TheAccountantTDM]

Fantastic work on these! It's so sad what the fate of the studio was but as you mentioned in the end the people involved in the studio and the franchises themselves are alive and well. Thanks for this retrospective series!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+TheAccountantTDM Yeah it was fortunate that a lot of the original staff came together and are making follow-ups to two of their greatest franchises at OtherSide. Had I made this a couple of years ago it would have probably have been more of a downer video at the end.

[@Arranvin9]

An excellent retrospective. I really hope to see more games that are spiritual successors to Looking Glass's masterpieces. At the moment Arkane seem to be the best hope, given the Otherside unfortunately seem to have really mismanaged the production of Underworld Ascendant and now Tencent are developing System Shock 3. What little has been released about the System Shock remake doesn't fill me with hope. In any case, even if the remakes don't live up to their predecessors, the original games are still classics that we can enjoy.

[@Jammet]

Wonderful retrospective, all in all! Thank you!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Jammet Leopard thanks very much. Happy that people are able to enjoy it now.

[@aloptuleamagnificanton4983]

fantastic video dude the people from looking glass studios where from another world and revolutionized gaming

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks! This was one of my first videos, so I'd like to redo it again with better sound, editing and such. Glad you enjoyed, though!

[@ZemplinTemplar]

9:33 Sara Verilli talking about her time at LGS, etc. She also did some writing later for Irrational, as late as SWAT 4 in 2004/2005. I think she still teachers or otherwise works at MIT. Saw a video interview with her relatively recently, about two years ago. You might even find it here on YT. 4:30 There's a poster for the original Westworld on the floor. I don't know if it's some in-joke added with the latest rerelease, but it's interesting, seeing as how Ramin Djawadi got his start helping out with audio on Thief II and System Shock II, and now composes for the Westworld series. :-O :-) Fantastic trio of videos ! There's been a few LGS retrospectives over here, but this one is probably the most thorough. A great slice through the studio's humble origins and almost unlikely history. 8-) Modern day game devs can still learn from the legacy of LGS.

[@TheVanillatech]

Thief never interested me. I was a quake player and the thought of running around a first person 3d polygonal world as a man trying to AVOID combat just never sat right with me. I sneaked through 1/3rd of Butcher Bay and Metro, but when I wanted to rip I could rip (and I did rip). For me, System Shock 2 is the real legacy of Looking Glass. One of my top 5 video games of all time, and still played today at least once a year, it was light years ahead of it's time and up there with Deus Ex and Quake 1 when talking about influence on gaming in general. RIP Looking Glass, and the Shock series. Bioshock is to System Shock what Oblivion / Skyrim is to Morrowind. LG were at the heart of the golden era of PC gaming, driving the technology and the creativity forward.

[@signalfromtherim]

Outstanding series! Fantastic work!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it. It was probably the paradigm shift of my channel when I moved over to primarily scripted content.

[@Maikelp]

This video series is insane. Great work here man, they're really detailed and documented, really interesting. Editing is top notch too. I hope to see more videos like these or the Cyberpunk one in the future.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks man! I really appreciate it. I do have more videos like these planned for the near future. Stay tuned.

[@Josephrobrose]

My new favorite channel. Thank you so much for your work.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks for watching, Joe! Glad to have you as a subscriber.

[@nurbsivonsirup1416]

If one day the Alien Overlords arrive and ask why they would spare us, I'll point them to these videos and tell them "this is what humans do, just because". Also, thanks for that bit of info on Ramin Djawadi, didn't know he was involved in SS2.

[@S4BRETOOTH]

Man, thank you for this series! Really informative and well made

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Campo Del Violin You're welcome. Thanks for watching!

[@FlagggRandall]

This deserves more views. Good work!!

[@xlr8466]

Man you are awesome. This is the best channel which accidentally found.

[@Polygonien]

good work with this retrospective! Seeing the video they shot when the studio closed was really sad. Such a talented and likeable bunch :/

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Yeah there were a lot of good people there. It wasn't all sad, there were some jokes and lighthearted stuff during the full video. I got the impression that people were already prepared for the close, it seemed. Full video if you haven't seen it already: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jIGpk3RuhtKnntU

[@ExtremePratt]

Fantastic video. Very well done with all 3 videos.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Too_Funny Thanks very much! I'm glad you enjoyed them.

[@NatiuneaJucatoare]

Great editing and great commentary. You deserve a lot more views.

[@SaiNarayan_]

Truly well done series of videos man. I really dig your style and am super inspired by your work. Keep going!

[@Morentius]

Great video series. I really got washed up with nostalgia while watching. Your editing skills are great and it shows in every video (not only this LG retrospective). I'm one of the few people who still plays Thief 1 and 2 mainly because of the amazing Fanmissions. To this day there's a couple of new releases each year and they are almost always really good and often times better than anything featured in the base game. Thief 2 is one of the few games that is always installed in my hard drive. I wish LG was still around but I'm glad that they influenced so many games with their legacy from big AAA titles like Dishonored to small indie games like NEON STRUCT. Keep making great videos like this!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks and I agree. LGS were something special and weren't afraid of trying new things and breaking boundaries. I do plan to continue doing retrospectives, just have to get emotionally ready for another Retro-Spec episode -- this set was a ton of work! :)

[@lukegvideos]

Fantastic set of videos. The editing and flow is stellar, as well as your narration. These are just beautiful videos above everything else. Subbed! Please keep doing your thing :)

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Really appreciate the positive feedback, thanks very much! I hope to keep up and improve the quality of the videos as I make them. I have started on my next Retro-Spec series, but may put out a couple smaller vids in the meantime as a stopgap. Thanks for subscribing!

[@DarkOgr]

Thank You!

[@AnaLivingston]

Great presentation and packed with awesome information. Thanks!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Ana Livingston Thanks for watching! :)

[@fragarena9910]

So underrated channel ;(

[@mbe102]

I'd definitely love to see more of these. So well done man. You should consider doing one on the Mechwarrior/Battletech Games, the up's, down's, past, present, and future. Just an idea. Heck, you could even do one for Westwood, that'd be neat.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+The Stry Show Thanks very much! Yeah I have a lot of ideas for future episodes (after a bit of a break with smaller videos I hope). Westwood basically invented the RTS genre and was one of its main creators for a decade, so I'm sure there's some interesting stories to be told in there.

[@cganderson25]

Love your videos bud keep up the awesome work!

[@QuestcastPenandPaper]

Damn you did a fine piece of work with these videos. Keep up the good work! :) Are you a team or a one man show?

[@Indigo_Gaming]

+Sendungmitdem Henrik Thanks! Glad it's all out now for people to enjoy. Right now it's a one man show, I do the research, writing, voice-over, gameplay recording and sourcing and stock footage sourcing and editing. It's a lot of work.

[@QuestcastPenandPaper]

Really? I thought this could only be managable by a team. I mean wtf? All the effort, effects scripting and so on...you got my biggest respect! Could you go into details what tools you are using? And how a video is made by you? I would really like to start videos relating more to games in the future. :)

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Right now I am using Adobe Audition for recording and sound mastering, Nvidia Shadowplay for recording gameplay, and Sony Movie Studio Premium 13 for video editing. I use a combination of footage I recorded as well as clips found online, game trailers, etc. I source a lot of free stock footage for the effects, moving backgrounds and such, and there is a lot of graphics and imagery that I create in Photoshop as well. I even had to recreate Looking Glass's logo from scratch since there isn't a high-res version available anywhere. Hope that helps.

[@IceHedge]

Indigo Gaming I love the effort you put into your videos. I know life gets busy and it can be difficult uploading videos, but even if you upload just one a year it's totally worth the wait with this kind of quality and so much heart put into each one!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks IceHedge. I think I've gotten some traction with my newer videos which are far from thrown-together, but I may return to the longform "Retro-Spec" format soon. Have a lot of ideas for this series, but my life was basically Looking Glass Studios for two months, so like you said, it's a lot of work. I intended on doing an Ion Storm Retro-Spec video shortly after this one, but ended up digging into other popular series and videos. Thanks for your support, and I'm glad you liked it!

[@apugalypse_now]

What WHAT YOU CAN JUST CLIMB OVER THE FENCE IN THE FIRST MISSION?! 6:20 ARE YOU KIDDING ME

[@Indigo_Gaming]

That's funny. I would regularly forget how effective the climb mechanic was in that game. That was when games actually had working systems that would affect any compatible geometry, rather than distinctly painted "you can interact with this" areas of modern AAA design.

[@angelluisalbertoromerocane5825]

Indigo Gaming the models of system shock look more detailed ¿what mid you were using?

[@georgehenson2412]

Before my usual pedantic corrections, I wanted to say that I very much enjoy your style of video making. The way you utilize visuals is very smart and I don't mind the small screen of gameplay (which I imagine is probably for Content ID reasons) because it's very visible and clear. The close-up shots I wish took up more of the frame faster, but I think you have some very intelligent design with the scrolling backgrounds and all. It kept me engaged in the video. On System Shock 2, I think it's the most playable out of all Looking Glass games today, and that includes Thief 2. It even beats Deus Ex a little bit in that regard, though I think Deus Ex is the better game overall. The two player mod also makes it very attractive for those who just want to go for a ride with it, so I definitely recommend it out of all the games they made. That's the main reason I'm excited for the reboots, sequels, and remakes. If they can make these games playable without sacrificing interaction, even if many of the sometimes pompous assumptions of the staff shine through they should be great games. The only real fear should be how heavily they're going to lean on action-centric gameplay. Okay, now time to be an ass again. -Looking Glass didn't approach Irrational, it was the other way around. The whole situation is rather complicated, but basically Ken moved his studio into the Looking Glass offices after securing the System shock deal, which I believe was entirely on Irrational's end. -Surprised you pronounced "Ramin Dajwadi" right! When I talked to Eric I was kind of afraid of butchering the name, but he thankfully said it first. Ramin did most of the really horror-like tracks and Eric worked on the ambient stuff and sound design like the SHODAN voice. -Intermetrics actually had several people on staff from the Norwegian game company FunCom, so there was always some game interest there. I don't know much about the specific reasons as to why Looking Glass was chosen, but I'm looking into it. There were also three cancelled N64 titles in all, one of which (WildWaters Extreme Kayaking) looked amazing. -You did forget to mention Deep Cover, which I did a write up on for Unseen64. It was to be another collaboration with Irrational that fell apart, supposedly, because of a Sony restructuring (who would have published it). There's also Arx Fatalis which Paul worked on which was essentially Ultima Underworld 3.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks for your feedback again. I tried the format I used now to keep the visuals interesting, as well as to make some space for callouts and extraneous info as well to the left. I also tried to create "the feel" of the game and frame around the gameplay to help make the games (especially the older ones) not so dated. Kind of like "artificial nostalgia" if that makes any sense. I agree System Shock 2 is still surprisingly playable especially with some light modding here and there, although I'd argue Thief 1 & 2 have held up quite well too. I was playing Thief in 3440x1440 just the other day at high framerate, and the UI scaled better than some modern games. I was very impressed. I just watched a video with Ken Levine, apparently it's somewhere in the middle according to him in 2004. Ken said that Paul approached him about making a game in the Thief engine, and System Shock 2 was the idea that Ken came up with for it. It's hard to tell exactly what went down to conflicting reports. neutralx2.com/2012/09/01/system-shock-2-retrospective-interview Ironically I butchered Eric and Terri Brosius's last name, but I aced Djawadi's name (I may have cheated and looked up an interview with him before recording). I didn't hear about Deep Cover, oddly. I may have to cover that if I ever do a Irrational Games retrospective. I did hear about a game Irrational did called The Lost that was cancelled in the US, eventually was sold to an Indian company that redid some of it and localized it. The videos I saw of that was pretty crazy after they "Bollywood-ized" it. I didn't get into too many specifics on the Intermetrics projects as the details were pretty fuzzy. So I just pulled the most interesting facts that I could find out of those (Command & Conquer, Miyamoto, etc.). Re: Post-LGS titles, yeah there were tons of games I could extrapolate on so I had to pick my battles again. I probably should have mentioned Arx Fatalis, but from what Paul said in an interview later, he helped on it some but it was primarily Arkane Studios' baby. Floodgate was more involved with Dark Messiah if I recall correctly, which most don't even associate with Ultima Underworld at all, but was very similar in nature and worked on by some of the original LGS staff as well as Arkane.

[@atarirob]

System Shock 2 is the greatest PC game ever made.

[@atarirob]

If anyone is having difficulty playing the game after starting, I'd recommend starting over and picking Navy. ALWAYS pick Navy as your starting character, hacking is paramount in the early stages of the game, but later you can chose to go for more of PSI or heavy weapons play style through upgrades. Navy is by far the best way to play though.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

It was a fantastic game for sure, and was almost a prequel (in gameplay mechanics) to my favorite game ever, Deus Ex.

[@atarirob]

Indigo Gaming I really liked Deus Ex in parts but a lot of it was a bit too obtuse, found myself searching everywhere aimlessly for the right key or keypad combo etc. Great game though, so far ahead of its time.

[@djdj696]

Excellent retrospective. I love the shit out of Looking Glass, but my baby will always be Westwood Studios. If you do a retrospective on them, that would be GLORIOUS!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks Jack! Westwood is one of my favorites too, and it's on the list for sure, but they've made over 40 games so it's gonna be a beast to tackle in the future.

[@JonahDominguez]

Really enjoyed these videos! The skewed videos made me a bit nauseous though

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Yeah I did that for this series a year or two ago but I don't really do that effect anymore. I thought it was fun to frame the gameplay in a background of sorts but it proved too much effort and time for little bonus.

[@3333218]

Pretty good! If you create more videos like this, please let me know!

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Thanks, I'm glad you liked it. If you want to see my future videos, that's what the subscribe button's for. ;)

[@3333218]

I've browsed your content and it seems this kind of video isn't what you usually create. If you do want to create more videos like this, then let me know.

[@GyroCoder]

What's the best way to do System Shock 2 co-op online right now? It was really buggy for a long time.

[@P0werL1ch]

RIP the SysShock Remake. Also, you forgot to mention Dead Space was supposed to be System Shock 3 initially.

[@Joel-ik3sz]

Looks like the poster for Glass lol

[@Kindlesmith70]

I never played many of these. I played System Shock 2 co-op and didn't feel it being a very definitive horror game. It felt like every other first person game. The upgrade systems had a Deus Ex feel or Shadowrun feel, the pria a agme I had played before System Shock and the latter experienced as a pen and paper, Sega Genesis and SNes game. I played Thief 2 first, being introduced to it via a demo. It's the first game that jumps to mind concerning stealth as the entire game was based around stealth. Loved the story that at the start takes a back seat then becomes a very real problem that needs to be dealt with. I later played thief 3 which kind of lost some of that structured feel traversing between regions as if they were contiguous. The story was kind of meh. The Hammerites faction as an enemy wasn't really all that appealing to me and its the part I remember the most out of that game. Much later I tried my hand at Thief but the complexity of the play area had me a little frustrated, too vast with not enough landmarks. Never finished the first game. The 4th one which was some kind of remake or reboot or whatever was kind of shit in comparison to all, but then I almost never like originals ripped apart for the sake of cash. Closest thing to the Ultima dungeon games I've played, my very first game of this type played on PC would have been Wolfenstein 3d. More recently, TES Daggerfall. That being said I've also played a bit of Legend of Grimrock and Eye Of The Beholder.

[@GyroCoder]

Part 3: The stuff I actually played.

[@Kindlesmith70]

I don't recall any dead bodies and such hanging around in System Shock 2. I do recall bodies on the floor however which weren't anything amazing to remark on. Makes me question if i was playing some censored version of the game. Why is everyone's experience of this game so highly remembered? Does this have something to do with being the first game of it's kind being experienced before anything else? I just don't see it as epic as others make it out to be.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

You might have played a censored version, there were corpses, hanging bodies, monstrous flesh beasts and blood on the walls. It was one of the scariest and immersive games by the time 1999 rolled around and was a clear predecessor to games like Deus Ex.

[@Kindlesmith70]

Gore for me isn't horror, especially pixelated gore. What I mean is it doesn't give me any sense of dread or impending doom. I don't suffer from mysophobia, necrophobia nor hematophobia either. I don't consider jump scares to be horror either; just more of a sudden surprise. I think of what frightens me in a game i would have to state the first thing would be an impending danger to the main character I am playing without the means to remove that danger, only being able to side step it. Ambiance and music matters a lot as does how the game relays all of it's mechanics. Some game examples: Aliens VS Predator 2 (2001) playing as Marine. It's dark. There's sounds. That motion sensor picking up everything that moves in front of me made me ever more paranoid. Resident Evil Outbreak. That haunting melody during the intro cinematic and the leach man thing at the hospital stage. Dead Space. More of a "Oh shit! Die! Die! Die!" initially that got old once the tricks and traps were learned. It became predictable. Outlast. The initial start of the game up until escaping the guy that cut your fingers off. Penumbra: Overture/Black Plague. The mystery was entrancing. Subnautica. Something about being alone in a vast unknown world where harm could come from any direction literally is really creepy. Project Zero (Fatal Frame) series. Some of the encounters and cutscenes were pretty terrifying. Rule of Rose. Much of it was due to being so very strange in the telling of it's story. Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. Definitely had it's moments. My biggest problem is if I learn of the workings it ceases to be effective. Some games are able to keep me completely captivated and immersed while others do something that takes me out of the experience entirely. It may be an out of place mechanic or the media they are conveying has been experienced by myself so many times it feels cliche. That's not to say I don't enjoy the games, it's just some hyped games for their "horror" aspect don't feel all that horrific to me and it's somewhat disappointing.

[@ZylonBane]

Nice video, but is it really a good idea to be using mods for a documentary piece?

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Good point. Some of the footage for System Shock 2 was modded, some not. The models are a bit primitive nowadays, but even vanilla System Shock 2 still looks pretty sharp even today due to the very clean and flat coloring of most textures. None of the modding has colored the writing in the videos or any of the statements I say in my videos, though. Thanks for watching!

[@Azoth86730]

Underworld Ascendant 2014- (what a disappointment lol, still no idea what went wrong here...) System Shock Remake 2016- System Shock 3 2016- It just hurts now looking back in 2021, a few months away from 2022...

[@Indigo_Gaming]

Yeah I'm wanting to do a revisit to this topic one day. The System Shock remake is looking solid, SS3 may be vaporware at this point, but we got some good surprises like PREY along the way...

[@leoric21]

Wow! ive always heard good things about system shock, however, i was reluctant to play it because of how bad deus ex was. now i see they are different franchises and not related. But now i will just wait for the remake.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

System Shock and its sequel are something special. I personally favor System Shock 2 over the original, but that's me. Which Deus Ex did you play? The original is my favorite game of all time, which I think would be liked by anyone who was into System Shock (similar mechanics and level design).

[@leoric21]

I played the original Deus ex it came bundled with the new reboot. I just got stuck in parts where i just could not progress I ended Watching more lets play videos then actually playing the game that i wasn't having any fun. The new one was good but I honestly don't remember what it was about. I remember crawling trough many vents a la the Half-Life series and the protagonest saying "I never asked for this" ALOT I feel the narative of the new series was reffering to the lore of the original so much that the story went over my head. That being said. I did like punching through walls. That was fun

[@Indigo_Gaming]

I don't think he said that line as much as people might think, although the "I never asked for this" meme got around big-time. The beauty of the game is that there are almost always three or more unique ways to pull off each mission. You could run-and-gun it, you could hack the security and get into locked rooms, turn off cameras or use the turrets or robots against the guards, or you can find back entrances, sneak around guards and use lethal or nonlethal takedowns for a stealth approach. The level design in these games are almost unmatched in the open-ended approaches you can take. To each their own I guess.

[@Pepella]

I didn't came here to feel though :'(

[@civilians4326]

Wikipedia isn't a source

[@andrehernandez9857]

Imagine what will it be like if Undertale was made by Looking glass studios... I'm not a fan of the game.

[@Indigo_Gaming]

I think Undertale suffered from the over-hype syndrome. It's a cool little game if you discover it and are surprised by what it has to offer, but it's not the industry-changing maelstrom of perfection that some purport it to be, in my opinion. It's also the polar opposite of what Looking Glass tried to do in their most famous games which was open-ended immersive simulation-like gameplay. Undertale had some choice but it was very game-y in its mechanics, despite it using its mechanics well to portray feelings, etc. Undertale is a fantastic effort though considering it was really made by one guy (Toby Fox).

[@andrehernandez9857]

+Indigo Gaming Yeah, honestly I never thought that a small game will have a massive (and cringey) Fandom, I mean It would've been better if it was just the type of small game that everybody barely knows that you just came across with and like the content in it like you just said. Hey, I didn't even play the game and the only things I liked is some of the characters and some few songs. But just imagine what will be like if Looking glass studios made Undertale. In my opinion, it will be alot more creative.

[@andrehernandez9857]

+Indigo Gaming No, seriously, just think what will it be if Undertale was by the same people behind System Shock and Thief.