System Shock 3 is attracting ‘a lot’ of publisher interest

Creative director for OtherSide Entertainment, Warren Spector, has revealed that while there’s been considerable interest from publishers interested in System Shock 3, the team has not yet ruled out self-publishing the game.

Starbreeze sold the rights to System Shock 3 back to OtherSide in February as it struggled with a “liquidity shortfall”. The development studio is now talking to “a lot” of potential publishers, with Spector stating the company is “flush enough” to press on with development whilst it attempts to secure a publisher. 

“It’s going great,” Spector told VGC. “We’re talking to a lot of partners and we have a lot of interest. We don’t have a deal right now, but luckily OtherSide is flush enough that we’re funding ourselves and can continue to do that for quite a while. Let’s see what happens.

“We need somebody to say, ‘yeah, let’s talk deal terms’ and we’re in that kind of discussion with some folks. But we’re not quite finished yet.”

“The reality is, OtherSide is a company of developers who want to develop games,” Spector added, expanding on the priorities of the studio. “We don’t particularly want to be a publisher. [Founder] Paul Neurath and I have worked with publishers before, Origin self-published when I was there, and we don’t want to get into the market of distributing stuff.

“I think it would be a huge distraction. We would have to hire staff to do that because we don’t currently have the expertise. I hope we don’t go that way. I’ll probably get in trouble for saying that if we do. We’re not ruling anything out, but at this point we’re looking for a publishing and funding partner.”

System Shock 3 was first unveiled at GDC back in March as one of Unity’s keynotes presentations during which the developer showed off alpha footage of the highly anticipated game.