Hydroponics original texture restoration attempt

[68571ea87d119tiphares4]

I tried tinkering around last year a bit: Back in 1999 when i first played System Shock 2 & i reached hydro deck for the first time, when the elevator doors finally opened i was utterly taken aback with shock, but in a negative way - hydroponic was mainly in bright white eyebleaching color.

It wasn't what i expected at all, it didn't wanted to fit into the wonderful mystical & cozy somber atmosphere of most other decks. Something felt wrong.

Years later i found out the original textures were much much more fitting, even perfect. Seems to me it was a last minute change before release, for whatever reason.

Had i've seen that deck back then with the wonderful original intended design for the first time: this would have been fully fullfilled expactation (see very last composite picture on the bottom).


I am no gamedesigner or modder & i know nothing, also my pc is extremely crappy & i've encountered problems back then when i wanted to recreate the original look, be it related to pc or my clumsiness. So it would be good if some normal person with more braincells than me would attempt such a project.

I've used those wonderful aforementioned beta screenshots as reference of course.


(Of course some sections should be left with the white textures/can profit from those, like the cultivation areas - logically due to reflection of light for plant areas)

[68571ea87d4c4Da9L]

I love this. And ever since i saw the beta screenshots I've wanted to see how Hydroponics would feel with those textures, because just looking at the screenshots it gives off a completely different ambience.

I actually tried something like this some years back, but nothing i ever bothered to save. It was also a rather crappy attempt, since i just replaced the white texture files with the darker originals, if Im remembering correctly.

EDIT: Even found my old topic about this. Screenshots expired though, bummer: https://www.systemshock.org/index.php?topic=9643.msg114162