The System Shock remake’s coolest bonus makes me wish I could smell it

The System Shock remake is finally upon us, and the immersive sim FPS game is an absolute blast from the past that endeavors to modernize a classic while staying true to what made it special in the first place. To that end, System Shock includes a somewhat hidden bonus that I absolutely love, and if you’ve missed the physical side of videogames in recent years, you’re going to love this too.

Amazingly, the System Shock remake comes with a 42-page manual. In a digital age where videogame manuals are all but extinct, the download versions of Nightdive’s swing at a classic come with a fully immersive and in-universe piece of art that is a total treat for the mind – you can also learn more about the game itself in our System Shock remake review, which dives into the immersive experience.

As a bit of a sci-fi nut, having almost 50 pages of fiction to parse through styled after an employee handbook for the TriOptimum Corporation – System Shock’s megacorp responsible for creating AI antagonist Shodan – filled with great lore and extensive designs to make it feel real is a delight. All you have to do is go to the game’s directory and you’ll find the PDF.

From a map of the US showing the abolishment of state borders in favor of a corporate makeup to the corporate structure of the System Shock universe, there’s a lot of digital eye candy for us. You even take a dive into how Shodan was designed, alongside some beautiful graphics of the solar system too.

I don’t want to share or talk about much else of the System Shock manual itself, as you should explore it yourself.

“Extremely pleased to show off the system shock game manual I wrote and designed for Nightdive Studios,” manual designer Joshua Jenkins says on Twitter, who adds they were hired “to make an old style game manual that also functions as a new employee handbook for the TriOptimum Corporation. They gave me an incredible amount of liberty to expand the world and add to the lore in interesting ways.”

So if you miss the days of physical videogame boxes and manuals as much as I do, then giving your 42-page in-universe System Shock remake manual a read is sure to be an incredible treat.

We’ve also got the System Shock system requirements for you to make sure your rig is up to snuff, alongside a breakdown of the best space games if you’re feeling like you want even more intergalactic megacorp madness.