Nightdive Studios' CEO Stephen Kick says Tencent owns the rights to the third System Shock game, and is in charge of whether or not it gets made.
The System Shock remake is in development at Nightdive Studios, and it seems like it’s currently on track to launch for PC and consoles sometime later this year. Series fans, however, are well aware of the fact that there’s another major System Shock project that hasn’t had quite the same luck behind-the-scenes.
System Shock 3 was confirmed to be in development at series creator Warren Spector-led OtherSide Entertainment years ago, but after facing prolonged development issues, the project’s rights were sold in full to Tencent, with Spector and his team no longer involved. The current status of the project, meanwhile, remains unknown, and as you’d expect, whether or not it ever ends up getting made is up to Tencent.
That’s according to Stephen Kick, CEO of Nightdive Studios – the owner of the System Shock IP – who recently told the same to VGC.
“When we originally acquired the rights to the franchise, we licensed the rights for the third game to Warren and Paul [Neurath] at Otherside,” Kick said. “They then subsequently sold their rights to Tencent.
“So Tencent currently has the rights to the third game, and we have the rights to do the remake of the first game and potentially a remake of the second game. That’s pretty much where it stands right now.”
Interestingly, Kick also mentioned that Tencent could also make further sequels in the series if they did decide to end up developing System Shock 3. “I think they technically could do 4 and 5 as well, but they’d have to do 3 first. So, we’ll see,” he said.
Earlier this year, OtherSide Entertainment announced that it had started development of a new immersive sim with Warren Spector leading the team.
Meanwhile, Nightdive Studio’s System Shock remake is due out sometime in 2022 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC.