While there's virtually nothing wrong with the inclusion of the NewDark engine for System Shock 2, for preservation's sake, I've made some patches that get the original (aka OldDark) engine working on modern systems, including the cutscenes.

What's Included
- A no-CD cracked version of the v2.3 EXE
- Direct3D and DirectDraw dgVoodoo wrappers for better compatibility on current systems.
- DSOAL for EAX emulation
- NewDark Engine as a backup (named NewDark.exe)

Download
SS2 Patch

Installation
1. Extact the content of this patch's "System Shock 2" folder to your System Shock 2 install directory. Overwrite the files when it asks you to.
2. Right-click on the new SS2.EXE, go to the Compatibility tab. Check the box that says "Run this program as an administrator". Hit Apply, then OK.
3. In your System Shock 2 installation, go inside the Data folder, and copy the cutscenes subfolder to the main directory where the game EXE is.
4. Run SS2.EXE and enjoy!!

Cutscenes Fix
If cutscenes still don't work, run IV5_FLTR.EXE in the "cutscenes fix" folder. If problem still persists, check the README.TXT in that folder.

PLEASE NOTE
When you launch the game the first time after startup, it may crash, but running it again works without issue.

Can I use your patch to revert gog version of the game to its original state (after deleting dgVoodoo wrapper)? I have an old Win98 pc and I would like to try it on that hardware. I've used Galaxy rollback but I think even the oldest version uses NewDark.

yes you can, though you will lose all the fixes. meaning, there will be no difference between this and just using an old cd with the official 2.3 patch.

yes, GOG/steam was using NewDark from day one, that was pretty much the point.

This is exacly what I want for this retro PC. Man, I would love to have original SS2 CDs. I've just finished reading about this whole NewDark think and now it's clear to me why there is no previous version.

I've tried using this patch on my Win98se Duron 700 and GeForce 2 PC and the game starts all right, into plays but then I get no sound at all and no settings are saved. I try messing with cam.cfg but to no sucess. Pity.