That was, of course, derailed by the outbreak of a whole-ass pandemic. The game was put on hold in February of 2018 while Nightdive’s senior management hunted for a publishing partner that could provide further funding. Everything looked like it was on track for a 2017 launch - and then, during GDC 2017, Nightdive announced it would move the game from the Unity engine to Unreal 4. The project was funded with 19 days to go and eventually brought in $US1.35 million from roughly 21,600 backers. The Kickstarter to fund the remake’s development began in 2016 and asked for $US900,000. Nightdive acquired the rights to System Shock in 2012 and brought on veteran designer Chris Avellone and several key staff from the Fallout: New Vegas dev team to help create it. System Shock is a ground-up remake of Looking Glass Studios’ legendary immersive sim from 1994. It’s just “Going Gold” is an increasingly outmoded industry term and somewhat out of place here. In a digital-forward market like PC gaming, it means “we’re ready to announce the release date and keep working on a Day One patch.” I say that not to shade Nightdive, who have worked hard and tirelessly on this remake for many years. To Go Gold is a games industry term that means a formal retail build has been settled on and discs are being pressed for sale. It should be noted that in 2023, the term Going Gold means almost nothing. That’s quite a bit sooner than anticipated. We don't have them yet, but we'll publish a story as soon as we pick up the System Shock achievements.The studio and its publishing partner Plaion announced today that the game has gone gold and will launch for PC on May 31. Whether we will ever see it on the platform, and in what form, remains a mystery.

This is a fundamental departure from the scope you sold to your project sponsors.' System Shock Remastered was due to be released on Xbox One. Plenty of them are angry, not just because this update provides no real answers as to how the studio plans to recover the project, but also because, as backer 'Steve' put it, 'I paid for a remaster, not a new product. With the switch we began envisioning doing more, but straying from the core concepts of the original title.A brief glance at the backer comments underneath Kick's update reveal a community that is at the very least disappointed and concerned at the news.

We shifted engines from Unity to Unreal, a choice that we don’t regret and one that has worked out for us.

We moved from a Remaster to a completely new game.

SYSTEM SHOCK (2018)