OtherSide Entertainment released a System Shock 3 pre-alpha gameplay teaser back in September. It was a last ditch attempt at finding a publisher for the game, which predictably failed. Over the next couple of months we began spotting numerous laid off employees on LinkedIn, and in December an anonymous former developer confirmed on our forums that OtherSide Austin no longer existed. OtherSide's Boston studio still survives somehow working on god knows what, but we all thought System Shock 3 was dead and buried. Then last week LESS T_T noticed that OtherSide's systemshock3.com domain had been quietly transferred to Chinese conglomerate Tencent a month earlier (and for good measure systemshock4.com as well). After several articles in the mainstream press were published about it earlier this week, today OtherSide confirmed somewhat vaguely that System Shock 3 had indeed been picked up by Tencent.

Some outlets interpreted this as an announcement that Tencent had acquired the entire System Shock franchise, but current IP owners Nightdive Studios were quick to shoot that down in a statement to PC Gamer.


What's clear in my opinion is that this is not a standard publishing deal announcement. OtherSide sound like they've passed System Shock 3 on to a new owner, not like they're about to work on it themselves. My guess is that Tencent intend to find or form a new studio to develop a System Shock sequel, perhaps with Warren Spector onboard to oversee development. Indeed, there were rumors to that effect last month. We shall see.