On the contrary. I won't play it if they, as was the case with Bioshock and Dead Space, remove gameplay elements, essentially turning the game into a linear corridor shooter. I've played my share of those already, thanks.

Actually, while I agree the hacking/etc elements were trimmed too much in Bioshocvk, I just considered it a seperate title and played it for the heck of it & liked it. It is a good game if one forgets the whole "spritual successor" nonsense & hype tacked onto it. Also disabling vita chambers helps make it more challenging as well, and the environments are nice.

Did you play Bioshock 2? Did you think it was as good as the original? I haven't played it, but from what I understand it adds minimal gameplay changes but somewhat expands on the story. Is this how you would want a System Shock sequel to be handled?

Never played Bioshock 2 yet(backlog though) but I think as long as the "heart" is there and the gameplay is similar or improved upon(not dumbed down of course) and the storyline fits then i'd play it.

That's the thing, what is the "heart" of it? I would argue that unfamiliarity was a major part of the experience in System Shock 2 and Bioshock (sans the re-heated plot points). Learning for yourself about this world as you play it out like what has happened here, who are the people in it and how do you fit in is a story telling technique a lot of games still don't really use, especially FPS games where plot advances purely by exposition and you are just along for the ride. The impression I get from a lot of people who played both and perhaps even liked both is that the core experience of unfamiliarity simply wasn't there in the sequel and the game suffered as a result.

But... SS2's gameplay is completely different from Bioshock's, and extremely dumbed down in comparison?

We tend to think that "sequels" are doomed to suck because of all the crappy games that came about because a company managed to secure rights to the name and made a crappy game. They usually don't involve the original game designer and things quickly go downhill from there.

Case in point: every "X-com" game after Apocalypse

Bioshock is certainly not the follow up to SS 2.
It is a complete joke against it. The shooter mechanics for a pc shooter are broken in bioshock and it is also dumbed down.