System Shock 2 is a first-person action role-playing survival horror
video game for Microsoft Windows, OS X and Linux, first released on
August 11, 1999. It was designed by Ken Levine and co-developed by
Irrational Games and Looking Glass Studios. Originally written as a
standalone title, it became a sequel to the 1994 PC game System Shock
after Electronic Arts signed on as the publisher. In a cyberpunk
depiction of 2114, the player assumes the role of a soldier trying to
stem the outbreak of a genetic infection that has devastated a starship.
As in System Shock, gameplay consists of combat and exploration aided by
acquired special abilities such as hacking and psionics. System Shock 2
received positive reviews, but failed to meet commercial sales
expectations. Critics later determined that the game was highly
influential in subsequent game design, particularly on first-person
shooters, and considered it far ahead of its time. It has been included
in several lists of all-time best video games. OtherSide Entertainment
has been licensed the rights to produce a sequel, System Shock 3.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Shock_2>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1492:
The first papal conclave held in the Sistine Chapel elected
Roderic Borja as Pope Alexander VI to succeed Pope Innocent VIII.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papal_conclave,_1492>
1828:
William Corder was hanged at Bury St Edmunds, England, for the
murder of Maria Marten at the Red Barn.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Barn_Murder>
1942:
Actress Hedy Lamarr and composer George Antheil received a
patent for their "Secret Communications System", an early technique of
frequency-hopping spread spectrum that later became the basis for many
forms of today's wireless communication systems.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Antheil>
1965:
Violent race riots began in Watts, Los Angeles, California,
lasting for six days and leaving 34 people dead and 1,032 others
injured.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watts_riots>
2012:
At least 306 people were killed and 3,000 others injured in a
pair of earthquakes near Tabriz, Iran.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_East_Azerbaijan_earthquakes>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
kayfabe:
(professional wrestling) The portrayal of events within the industry as
real; the portrayal of professional wrestling and the accompanying
storylines as not staged or worked.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/kayfabe>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
All the martyrs in the history of the world are not sufficient to
establish the correctness of an opinion. Martyrdom, as a rule,
establishes the sincerity of the martyr, — never the correctness of
his thought. Things are true or false in themselves. Truth cannot be
affected by opinions; it cannot be changed, established, or affected by
martyrdom. An error cannot be believed sincerely enough to make it a
truth.
--Robert G. Ingersoll
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_G._Ingersoll>