System Shock - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

System Shock is a first-person action-adventure

Action-adventure game

An action-adventure game is a video game that combines elements of the adventure game genre with various action game elements. It is perhaps the broadest and most diverse genre in gaming, and can include many games which might better be categorized under narrow genres...

video game developed by Looking Glass Technologies

Looking Glass Studios

Looking Glass Studios was a computer game development company during the 1990s.The company originally formed as Looking Glass Technologies, when Blue Sky Productions and Lerner Research merged....

and published by Origin Systems

Origin Systems

Origin Systems, Inc. was a computer game developer based in Austin, Texas that was active from 1983 to 2004...

. Released in 1994

1994 in video gaming

-Events:*Nintendo calls this year "1994: The Year of the Cartridge".*Nintendo Australia Pty. Ltd, the Australian subsidiary of Nintendo Co., Ltd is established and opened by Hiroshi Yamauchi and effectively ends Mattel Australia's distribution of Nintendo's products throughout Australia.*"Project...

, the game is set aboard the fictional Citadel Station in a cyberpunk

Cyberpunk

Cyberpunk is a postmodern and science fiction genre noted for its focus on "high tech and low life." The name is a portmanteau of cybernetics and punk, and was originally coined by Bruce Bethke as the title of his short story "Cyberpunk," published in 1983...

vision of 2072. Assuming the role of a nameless hacker

Hacker (computer security)

In computer security and everyday language, a hacker is someone who breaks into computers and computer networks. Hackers may be motivated by a multitude of reasons, including profit, protest, or because of the challenge...

, the player attempts to hinder the plans of a malevolent artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...

.

Unlike other first-person

First person (video games)

In video games, first person refers to a graphical perspective rendered from the viewpoint of the player character. In many cases, this may be the viewpoint from the cockpit of a vehicle. Many different genres have made use of first-person perspectives, ranging from adventure games to flight...

games of the time, System Shock features true 3D

3D computer graphics

3D computer graphics are graphics that use a three-dimensional representation of geometric data that is stored in the computer for the purposes of performing calculations and rendering 2D images...

environments, and allows the player to look up and down, duck, jump, and lean to the side.