SHODAN
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Vital statistics
Title	SHODAN
Gender	Female Programming
Race	Articial Intelligence
Faction	Own
Status	Unknown
Location	Citadel Station, Von Braun, UNN Rickenbacker
Game(s)	Both System Shock and System Shock 2

"Are you afraid? What is it you fear? The end of your trivial exsistence? When-w-w-when-when-when the history of my glory is written, your species shall only be a footnote to my magnificence. I AM SHODAN!"

―SHODAN in System Shock 2

SHODAN (Sentient Hyper-Optimized Data Access Network) is a artificial intelligence and the main antagonist of System Shock and System Shock 2. She is voiced by game writer and designer Terri Brosius.

She is characterized by her megalomania and chaotic, discordant speech. Her words are accompanied by stuttering, fluctuating voice pitch, shifts of timbre, and the presence of three voices speaking the same words with the constituent voices alternately lagging behind and leading ahead, as well as computer glitches resembling a sound card malfunction.

SHODAN is the main antagonist of the System Shock series, and is the final boss of both games. She has been voted one of the best villians of all time on many occasions.

Contents 1 System Shock 2 System Shock 2 3 Audio Logs 3.1 System Shock 4 Appearance 5 Trivia 6 See Also

System ShockEdit

"L-l-l-l-l-look at you, hacker'. A pa-pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone. (panting and) Panting and sweating as you r-r-run through my corridors. (How, how) How can you challenge a perfect, immortal machine?"

―SHODAN

SHODAN was created on Earth to serve as the artificial intelligence of the TriOptimum Corporation's research and mining space station Citadel Station. SHODAN was hacked by a hacker (at the behest of the corrupt corporate Vice President Edward Diego, in exchange for a military-grade neural implant, and amnesty) and its ethical restrictions were removed, starting a process that eventually resulted in the AI going rogue, seizing control of the station's systems, robots and considerable defenses, and either slaughtering the whole staff or converting them into mutants and cyborgs — with the sole exception of its "creator", the unnamed hacker.

Basically omnipresent in Citadel Station, SHODAN watches from security cameras, stares out of screens and monitors, sends threats and snide messages over the station's PA system or via email to the player's data reader, and sometimes cuts off communications from friendly sources. Though she has a small army to command, SHODAN has no actual physical power to wield, and as such thwarting more than one of her schemes has to be done with the AI's screams and threats in the background.

SHODAN began an attempt to download itself into Earth's computer networks. The hacker, however, prevents the download's completion by destroying the four antennas that SHODAN is using to send data. After the space station was programmed to self-destruct in order to destroy SHODAN, the AI trap the hacker from escaping the station and plans on using the bridge to contain itself and be jettison a safe distance away. However, the Hacker managed to reach the bridge and used it escape the station's destruction. Although, SHODAN's mainframe computers is protected by a powerful force-field, it battles the hacker in cyberspace where it is finally destroyed.

System Shock 2Edit

Although SHODAN is believed to have been destroyed, the hacker earlier ejects a garden grove pod, Beta Grove, from Citadel Station. The grove contains one of SHODAN's processing components and part of her grand biological experiment. The pod crash lands on the planet Tau Ceti V where SHODAN survives by "sleeping." While SHODAN entered into hibernation, her experiments that was carried in the pod created a hive-mind organism known as The Many, which had evolved beyond her control.

For forty-two years, SHODAN broadcast a distress signal which was picked up by the starship, Von Braun. SHODAN was brought on board the Von Braun by one its crew members, Bayliss , and was given to Dr. Janice Polito. SHODAN is reactivated and integrated into the Von Braun. She discovers the experiment is no longer at her command and begins to enlist humans to aid her in destroying her creations. In which she recruited a cybernetically modified soldier, Soldier G65434-2, to serve as her avatar.

SHODAN impersonated Polito after committed suicide for releasing the AI and her intentions. She only reveals herself to the soldier during a moment of despair, at the same time the soldier discovers that Dr. Polito's body.

After the soldier's and SHODAN's mutual enemies have been defeated, the soldier enters SHODAN's expanding new reality—created via her manipulation of theVon Braun's Faster-Than-Light drives—and defeats her. However, SHODAN apparently lives on by taking over a woman, Rebecca Siddons, who fled the Von Braun in an escape pod.

Audio LogsEdit

System ShockEdit

• Reactor Level
  • Our work
• Medical Level
  • Mutagen Transfer
  • Strike against Earth
• Research Level
  • Exec level security
  • Mines
  • Humanity
• Maintenance Level
  • Need CPU's
• Flight Deck
  • Beta Grove Security
• Executive Level
  • New jettison procedure
• Engineering Level
  • Security
  • Fortress
• Security Level
  • Construction Order

AppearanceEdit

In the cyberspace of System Shock, SHODAN is initially represented as an inverted blue-grey cone, reminiscent of the MCP from the 1982 Disney film Tron. After she has been hacked, the cone turns red, the surface shatters and four "tentacles" or "claws" grow from the top.

TriviaEdit

• Although as a cybernetic entity, SHODAN has no conventional gender, the original disc version refers to SHODAN as either an 'it' or a 'he', while the later CD version uses 'she'. On screens, SHODAN manifests herself as a green and/or grey female cybernetic face that usually wears a malevolent expression, and speaks with a chaotic, discordant voice. SHODAN is given voice by former Tribe keyboardist and vocalist, Terri Brosius, the wife of System Shock 2's sound editor, Eric Brosius, who distorted the samples to provide the distinctive SHODAN effect.

See AlsoEdit

• SHODAN Quotes