The Chinese conglomerate Tencent Holdings Ltd., now has control over the System Shock video game franchise.

In a tweet posted by OtherSide Entertainment, the developers of the yet unreleased System Shock 3 stated they “are happy to announce that Tencent will be taking the #SystemShock franchise forward.”

It is unknown at the moment whether this means that Tencent has only acquired the System Shock franchise, or if they now own OtherSide Entertainment in part or whole.

OtherSide Entertainment goes on to claim they had difficulties bringing System Shock 3 to reality.

“As a smaller Indie studio, it had been challenging for us to carry the project on our own. We believe Tencent’s deep capabilities and expertise as a leading game company will bring the franchise to new heights.”

System Shock began as a series in 1994 from the now defunct LookingGlass Technologies. In the years since its released it has achieved a cult status as a notorious early RPG. A sequel was released in 1999 and published by Electronic Arts, making System Shock 3 the first new game in over 20 years.

As we previously reported here on Niche Gamer, Tencent recently acquired the ownership of domains SystemShock3.com and SystemShock4.com. It is worth noting that even though Tencent acquired the domain SystemShock4.com, System Shock 3 is seemingly still in development.

Tencent’s acquisition of the System Shock franchise comes months after news that the System Shock 3 development team was allegedly no longer employed at Otherside Entertainment.

It is unknown if this acquisition will have any impact on Nightdive Studio’s remake of the original System Shock, due to release later this year. We will keep you informed as we learn more.

As of January, 2020 Tencent has 100% ownership of Riot Games, 80% of Grinding Gear Games, 40% in Epic Games, 29% in Funcom, 5% in Activision Blizzard, 5% in Ubisoft, 5% in Paradox Interactive, and others.

Until otherwise stated, System Shock 3 is in development for Windows PC.

Image: Twitter