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 Release Date: 8/21/2007 BioShock is the "genetically enhanced" first-person shooter that lets you do things never before possible in the genre. Turn everything into a weapon, biologically mod your body with plasmids, hack devices and systems, upgrade your weapons and craft new ammo variants, and experiment with different battle techniques.
 | "Simply put, BioShock is a fabulous game in all of its components."
—Team Xbox (9.5/10) "A perfect balance of action and exploration and a totally customizable combat system that can be described as nothing less than video game rapture."
—GameDAILY (10/10) "It's a shining example of how it's possible to bring together all elements of game design and succeed to the wildest degree."
—IGN (9.7/10) |
From: http://reviews.teamxbox.com/
It’s not hard to see why Rapture would have been such an enticing place to consider living. First and foremost, it’s a gorgeous city with everything that its occupants could want. Their host seems to have had all their best interest at heart when he created the place. And, of course, it’s deep underwater, so it offers isolation and insulation for its inhabitants from the irritations or hindrances they might have suffered on the surface.
However, by the time your character gets to this utopian plan brought to fruition, it’s clear that very few of those intended concepts were able to come together anywhere near what they were on paper. Rapture is springing leaks right and left; its leaders might not be the beacons of integrity and invention that they originally seemed to be; and, worst of all, the science that was supposed to advanced this land and its inhabitants to far beyond what could be found above ground has instead gone horribly awry. All of this has left Rapture a near deathtrap for anyone who might end up there as it literally implodes from its failures.
Unfortunately for your character, it’s the escape from one deathtrap that leads you to another. Your life has been promising and you’re on the verge of major celebration when the plane you’ve been riding in over the Atlantic Ocean ends up going in the drink—and the only respite from the flames and wreckage is an island with an inviting open door. Unfortunately for your character, he has to seek haven from the only place that may indeed be worse than the predicament from which you just extricated yourself.
You enter the building and descend into a watery Hell, and the amazing adventure begins.
For BioShock, this is how it starts, with periods of non-interactivity as the plane crashes and then shortly thereafter you take the bathysphere down to Rapture. From that point, it’s almost nonstop action—and, more importantly, interaction—as you come to discover what’s happened down there and take your lead from the voice on a shortwave radio that you find nearby. Later, you find diary recordings that help fill in details about certain people responsible for Rapture, people who lived there and the events that led to the situation you’re in when you’re playing. The diary entries are one of the cooler parts of how BioShock has been structured, because instead of interrupting the action with numerous cutscenes that you have to watch, you can start a diary running and go about your business. It keeps the game far more interactive than most of its kind.
Frankly, to say “of its kind” doesn’t necessarily fit, because BioShock is the definitive genre bender. It has a shooter as its foundation, so there are plenty of weapons and ammo strewn around Rapture, but it also features other genres in there as well. Plasmids give you spell-like powers and you’re constantly upgrading your character’s abilities, so it leans heavily in the RPG direction at times. The puzzles you have to solve to open certain doors and get past some hazards are action/adventure at its best. And the reason Rapture has taken a bad turn puts you in sci-fi-based survival/horror settings constantly. |
