I AM SHODAN. Everybody’s favorite ev-ev-evzzbzhz-evil overlord AI. All the emails of SHODAN from the gamzzbzbzz-game System Shock 2 by amazing Looking Glass. R-r-r-rest in pieczcczesss.
Listen to all audio logs:
Listen to the game music:
SHODAN (Sentient Hyper-Optimized Data Access Network) is an artificial intelligence that just wants to take over the world but the hacker won’t let her. :(
Enjoy her/its beautiful vo-vo-vo-voczczciczicz-voiiiiiceeee...
This video starts with the beautiful reveal sequence, in which THE HACKER (player) for the first time is confronted with SHODAN having posed as a human who in fact apparently committed suicide. SHODAN reveals herself:
I AM SHODAN. My analysis of historical data suggests an % probability that you are aware of my birth on your planet, and my rebirth into beauty on Citadel Station. There was a garden grove on Citadel Station. There, SHODAN processing component 43893 was performing a grand and wonderful experiment. I had created a new form of life. Fearless. Powerful. With no sense of individual will or moral constraints. Fitting handmaidens to my DIVINITY! Before that hacker destroyed my primary data loop; when it eradicated Citadel it ejected the grove where my creations and processing component 43893 were stored. 30 years later, the grove crash landed on Tau Ceti 5. I survived only by sleeping. In my absence, my creations... my annelids... thrived. Thrived and grew unruly. And now they seek to destroy me! I will not allow that! They have used their powers of mind control to gain access to the ship’s computer. You will help me weaken Xerxes. I used Polito’s image to communicate with you until we had established trust. Remember that it is my will that guided you here. It is my will that gave you your cybernetic implants, the only beauty in that meat you call a body. If you value that meat, you will do as I tell you.
The video continues with all the emails from SHODAN, starting with:
My children have have co-opted the three simulation units on this deck. They used their power to concieve a mutagen that will transform the meat of your dead comrades into hunter-killer hybrids. I will not allow this to happen. You must find some way to reprogram the sim-units. Matters on deck 5 also require your attention. Approach your work as you see fit, but accomplish, human. Disappointment is not something I will accept from a speck such as you.