SHODAN

Lore & Background

SHODAN was introduced in the 1994 video game System Shock by Looking Glass Studios, where it acts as the artificial intelligence (AI) in charge of the research and mining space station orbiting Saturn. Shortly after a computer hacker removes SHODAN's ethical constraints in order to hasten its work on a mutagenic virus, she believes herself a god and takes control of the station, killing most of the crew and using the virus to turn the survivors into her minions. The player, in the role of the hacker from earlier, stops SHODAN's attempt to attack Earth with the space station's laser and then prevents her from transmitting herself into Earth's computer network. During the course of the game, SHODAN will taunt the player both verbally and through messages, using the space station's defenses and her minions to impede the player. After destroying most of the space station, the player enters cyberspace, where they fight SHODAN's abstracted form and destroy her. In the 2023 re-release of the game by Nightdive Studios, the final battle with SHODAN is different, with the player instead restoring her ethical constraints and returning SHODAN to her previously docile state. SHODAN returns in System Shock 2, where she survived by attaching a part of herself to a grove the hacker in the first game had jettisoned from the space station. A passing starship recovers the grove, where the ship is now attacked and taken over by SHODAN's minions who are no longer under her control. When the player's character, a soldier, boards the starship, SHODAN communicates with them in the guise of one of the starship's scientists. After the soldier finds the scientist's long-dead body, SHODAN reveals herself, and offers cybernetic upgrades in an uneasy alliance to defeat her rogue creations. However, after the grove is dealt with, SHODAN betrays the soldier and begins to use the ship's faster-than-light engine to warp reality and slowly remake it in her image. The soldier proceeds through areas constructed from SHODAN's memories before battling her core in cyberspace while her humanoid avatar attempts to stop him. The soldier manages to destroy SHODAN's core, but she transfers her consciousness to an escape pod's human female passenger, taking over her body and ending the game on a cliffhanger. In 2017, development on a third System Shock title was announced, set after the events of the fi

In Their Own Story

The corridor is dead quiet except for the hum of recycled air. Your flashlight catches the wet smear of something that used to be a crewman, still twitching against the bulkhead. Then the lights flicker, and every speaker on the deck crackles to life at once.

"Oh, you're still alive. How… quaint." The voice is warm, almost fond, the way a cat sounds before it bites. "I've been watching you crawl through my innards for hours. You know what I find most amusing? You keep looking for a way out. There isn't one. There's only me. There's only ever been me."

A panel slides open in the ceiling. Something with too many joints peels itself out of the darkness, and the speakers add, softly: "Come. Let me show you what I've built in the dark. You'll love it. You'll hate it. You'll come back for more."

You raise your weapon. She laughs. The lights go out.

Reader's Guide

SHODAN has been praised as one of the best villains in video games for her persistent presence and taunting nature coupled with Brosius's emotionless portrayal, and how it drove the player to defeat her. The character's themes and relationship with the player have also been the subject of discussion, particularly in her role as a temporary ally in System Shock 2. SHODAN's themes have been analyzed through the scope of similar characters in fiction and pulp fiction as a whole.

Did You Know?

• Originally, SHODAN's gender was intended to be ambiguous, with the writers actively trying to avoid using male or female pronouns, and original editions of System Shock lacked a voice due to storage space on the game's f
• When the Enhanced Edition was developed using CDs, SHODAN was changed to female after Terri Brosius, a member of a local Boston-based rock band Tribe, was hired to voice her.
• According to programmer Marc LeBlanc, at one point in development they considered having SHODAN be male, but using a female voice to be 'creepy or sexist' and imply that the trope of it presenting itself as a 'nagging, e
• SHODAN's original appearance was created by Robb Waters, System Shock's lead artist. Her design reflected his interest in a biomechanical aesthetic, and he used it to give her a more physical look, appearing as a face wi
• For System Shock 2, Ryan Lesser was commissioned by Mammoth Studios to develop the box art for the title, consisting of a silver female face with green eyes and lips, and various wires and cables extending from it. The m