Yep, System Shock 2. Like last year's winner (Half-Life), System Shock 2 doesn't fit well into any category. In fact, it blatantly laughs in the face of convention. I have no idea what to call this game. Is it a first person shooter? It's got lots of action, and it's played from a first person perspective. Is it an RPG? It features skills and character classes. Is it a strategy game? Resource management is key to finishing the game.

It's because of System Shock 2's inability to be pigeon-holed that it shines. The game is creepy (really, really, creepy, in fact) and the storyline is told with expert skill. Add in the fact that with the patch (available from the game's official site) there's a great co-operative mode, and you've got a game that has a longevity that few games can brag about.

Creating a follow-up to what is considered to be a true classic is never easy. But with System Shock 2, the folk at Looking Glass have outdone themselves, and created a game that can stand next to the original with pride.

Using some of the features of the original, SS2 has elements of a first-person shooter, but allows plenty of creativity in generating and upgrading your character throughout the game. The game has great graphics and sound to create a realistic, dark and moody environment. It also utilizes a strong enemy AI that will bring any bad guys within earshot of a battle into the fray, causing you to really role play instead of going into every room with guns blazing. SS2 is high in tension and long in detail, and winner of GameSpy's RPG of the year.

This is the story of a young and inexperienced company that was given the chance to develop the sequel to one of the top ten games of all time. The sequel was allotted roughly one year of development with its full team. To make up for the short development cycle and correspondingly small budget, the project was supposed to reuse technology. Not technology in the sense of a stand-alone engine from another game, but individual components that were spun off from yet another game, Thief: The Dark Project. The Thief technology was still under development and months away from completion when our team started working with it. To cap everything off, the project was a collaborative effort between two companies based on a contract that only loosely defined the responsibilities of each organization.

Well we were wrong about that one. "Maybe someday" was right, and that day is today. Our java chat client, courtesy of our good friends and associates at the StarChat network, is fast, simple, and easy on your browser. Just go here, enter your user name, select if you want to enter the Shock2, Thief or Deus Ex chatroom, and hit [Connect Now!]