Can someone "sell me" on Bioshock?

[Kintaro56]

I rented it a while back, and didn't spend too much time on it. I unlocked the Achievement for wasting three people in a pool of water (or something like that) and then returned the game.

I realize that I didn't get very far in the game, but I thought the weapons and targeting were subpar.

I have read about how deep game it is, plus it's on sale at Best Buy...but I'm still not entirely convinced.

Does the game get a lot better as you get further into it? I could use a new game right about now...

Thanks!

[Atari 5200]

Go get it.

[Mr. Smashy]

If playing the game didn't convince you of its greatness, there is no hope for you.

[Slate]

Can't you download the demo? The demo is of the first level, With a few differences.

[Half Japanese]

I've gotta say, BioShock was a good game, but I didn't feel it was a great one. At its core, it's still just a FPS, albeit one with special powers that lent themselves well to the FPS stylings. I beat it, but once you've beaten it, I really don't see the point in going back again unless you're an achievements whore.

Here's the part where I duck behind the flame shield.

[dsullo]

A game really has to grab me in order for me to play it all the way through. Bioshock grabbed me , I specifically loved the underwater city concept and the 50s style music and architecture. I loved the little sisters and the BIG DADDY is the best of all bosses. All in all it was a great game, you should play it all the way through once, just resist the temptation of harvesting the little sisters for more power. The ending will suck.

[evil_genius]

You can borrow mine.

[Captain Wrong]

I've gotta say, BioShock was a good game, but I didn't feel it was a great one. At its core, it's still just a FPS, albeit one with special powers that lent themselves well to the FPS stylings. I beat it, but once you've beaten it, I really don't see the point in going back again unless you're an achievements whore.

Here's the part where I duck behind the flame shield.

Agreed.

After a friend raved about it, I got it, put about four hours in, got bored and haven't gone back. The atmosphere and graphics are really neat, but at the end of the day it's still "run here, find the key, shoot some d00ds, etc."

[DJ Daishi]

....had probably one of the biggest gaming twists of "07.

(spoiler alert)











I especially like that part when you actually become a "BIG DADDY"!!!.


(ok, you can open your eyes now!)

[diskoboy]

....had probably one of the biggest gaming twists of "07. (spoiler alert) I especially like that part when you actually become a "BD".

No shit.

One of the best plot twists ever seen in a video game, period.

And those of you who played this game, and put it down, would you kindly pick up the game again and at least meet Andrew Ryan face to face and then come back and give us your opinions. It adds a great deal to the story, and only pulls you even farther into the tragic story of Rapture and all it's people.

And those who have played through the game know I slipped a spoiler somewhere in this post.

[evil_genius]

I was blown away after the AR scene.

[DJ Daishi]

lol, would you kindly give me your wallet!

[Captain Wrong]

And those of you who played this game, and put it down, would you kindly pick up the game again...

Well, considering between you and the previous poster, I seem to have gotten MAJOR FUCKING SPOILERS and since the story seems to be the major point everyone hangs this game's greatness on, I don't see the need really. If I want story, I'll watch a movie or read a book.

[kaedesdisciple]

....had probably one of the biggest gaming twists of "07. (spoiler alert) I especially like that part when you actually become a "BD".

Thanks for that, I really appreciate the spoiler alert and the spoiler in the same line. Smooth move.

[fcw3]

SPOILER ALERT

I'm not very far along in the game. But fairly early on, the game put me in a moral quandry. I've never played a FPS that made me hesitate shooting an "enemy". Sure, I know the little sister wasn't real, but as she cowered away from me while the guy on the radio was yelling at me to kill her and that she wasn't human and the doctor was begging me not to kill "her child", I was emotionally torn.

Never had a game do that to me. Maybe it was the FPS perspective that made the character more "me" than in role playing games.

I look forward to more moments like that.

Spoiler over

The game also drips atmosphere. The art-deco look of the place really pulled me in.

YMMV.

FRED

[Half Japanese]

If I want story, I'll watch a movie or read a book.

I'm not alone! I'll be the first to admit I don't play a ton of RPGs, but I have yet to find a truly nuanced, worthwhile story in any video game, BioShock included. I'm not saying everything should be an arcade blastfest (Zod knows we have enough Robotron clones clogging up XBLA and the PSN), but I would much rather have something aesthetically pleasing and (most importantly) tons of fun to play. Stories, even those for games I've played that have been regarded as "good," are still just basic 'good vs. evil with a pinch of betrayal, add twist for flavor' routines.

If there's a game out there with an Alan Moore level of depth in video games, I'd love to know about it, because my first thought in hearing about how a game's story is good is always a sarcastic "really?"

[ProgrammingAce]

Half Japanese: play Indigo Prophecy

[diskoboy]

Well, considering between you and the previous poster, I seem to have gotten MAJOR FUCKING SPOILERS and since the story seems to be the major point everyone hangs this game's greatness on, I don't see the need really. If I want story, I'll watch a movie or read a book.

Meeting Ryan was not the spoiler I was talking about. He's the main antagonist of the game. Anyone who plays the game knows you'll meet him eventually.

Beat the game and then read my previous post again.

Ad believe me - the full story of Rapture puts most movies and Books to shame.

[Half Japanese]

Half Japanese: play Indigo Prophecy

I'll try to give it a shot.


A[n]d believe me - the full story of Rapture puts most movies and Books to shame.

No offense, but you should try expanding your intake of books and movies. The thing is, I think at some level, with the types of gameplay we're used to at this point in time, a great game and a great story are almost mutually exclusive. The underlying story might be interesting, but rarely are they fleshed out to the point of becoming something that truly grips you. Another inherent divide between (most) games and having a good story is the reliance on pick-ups and other things that shatter believability. We've started to see many games move away from them, at least as far as health is concerned (i.e., in many FPS/action games these days your health regenerates and you only die if you stay under fire for too long), but these aren't the only things keeping games from having great stories.

Many games, particularly RPGs and shooters, have cliche-ridden, nonsensical stories whose only means of staying interesting are head-scratching twists or triggering fetch-quests. To me, that isn't a good story or clever writing, but laziness and refusal to truly innovate. The steadfast reliance on cliches can be fantastic in the proper context (God Hand), but as a whole, it's doing nothing to push storytelling in games forward. At the end of the day, I suspect most RPG fans and FPS fans aren't playing the games for the rewarding story, but for the gameplay (particularly on the FPS front, where there has always been a strong reliance on multiplayer to keep players coming back). I don't think that a great story in a game is impossible, I just think that the watermark is so low that anything with an interesting atmosphere and a unique look can be passed off as having one.

[digitalpress]

Wow. Hard to believe there are so many people who didn't like the game. Not just passed on it but flat out didn't like it! Just goes to show what a diverse community we are.

I can say that in my many years of gaming I've seen few games with the depth of BioShock. It's hard to describe, but so often I play games and think "been here, done this" but with BioShock I was continually introduced to new concepts. Like many others, out the outset I felt "Why does everyone love this game? It's just an FPS in an art-deco setting!". Probably at the top of my list of creative elements is the story that unfolds. Subtle at first but about halfway thru the game you realize "I've never seen THIS in a story before". It breaks the molds on storytelling. A previous poster mentions that you become a big daddy but not a major spoiler to me. Better to experience without knowing beforehand? Yes. But it's not the game's SPOILER.

Loved the game, played it to the end twice but I can also honestly say that's that for this game. Some multi-player or online option would have made it immortal. As it stands, it's a highly stylish, exceptionally programmed, and most of all well-told adventure. A game I will never forget amidst a sea of games that I've already forgotten.

[Half Japanese]

Wow. Hard to believe there are so many people who didn't like the game. Not just passed on it but flat out didn't like it! Just goes to show what a diverse community we are.

Just to clarify, I liked the game, I just didn't feel it was as pants-shittingly good as it's been made out to be.

[digitalpress]

Just to clarify, I liked the game, I just didn't feel it was as pants-shittingly good as it's been made out to be.

Yeah man, it's cool. We all have different tastes, that was my point.

Still, I wish there were more developers out there *thinking* about their games like the guys who did BioShock did. It's pretty rare that I find myself near the end of a story in a game WONDERING what's gonna happen next or *gasp* surprised by the turn of events. And that, within a very solid action game. But that's just me.

[ProgrammingAce]

Just wait until you see what they have planned for BioShock 2

*Spoiler*

No, i'm not going to tell you

*end spoiler*

[Untamed]

I thought it was understood how you post spoilers for games.

I guess not.


I regret reading this thread.

:(

[ProgrammingAce]

wrong thread...

[Graham Mitchell]

Bioshock is my favorite game of the last decade.

I bought a 360 to get it. I'm really hesitant to buy any other 360 games because I know they're not going to be this cool.

Some people don't dig it, and that's fine. But, as I've said in other threads on this game, I'm a fairly literate person and I thought the story of Bioshock was cooler than most books I read or movies I watch.

I don't think the game really has "plot twists" per se, either. I don't think I'm spoiling much by saying this: when you start the game, you will not understand why you are doing what you are doing. And as the game evolves, just about every question you ever had about everything you're seeing will be answered. It's a slow process, but it'll keep you hooked. It's not really plot twists--the truth was there in front of you the whole time, you just didn't realize it. [And please don't bother getting your +1 post count by telling me "that IS a plot twist". When obvious plot twists happen in movies, I groan. I think they're lame. Bioshock didn't rub me that way at all.] In addition, the narrative is sparse and has holes-most of the story are things you have to infer from the evidence you discover. Certain details are shown to you, but never actually discussed. I can't say much more about that without spoiling some things.

And everybody's so caught up on the game mechanics, and I find that's much of the time the major issue people take with the game. But I kind of feel that the gameplay wasn't the primary focus of what the developers were going for. I feel it's more about the environment and the setting it creates, and it's unique ability to pull you out of your world and get you concerned with the one displayed on your TV screen/monitor. It's escapism. The gameplay is secondary to the experience. A good analogy would be the game Snatcher. Snatcher really do anything phenomenal gameplay-wise? No. But it's hard not to love that game, and many people who play it say they will never forget it. Bioshock is on that level.

That said, despite game mechanics not being the game's main focus, I find it does have a fair amount of replay value. I'm going through it a second time, making...the opposite choices that I did the first time to see what happens.

The only gaming experience that has ever come close to this for me was playing Snatcher 10 years ago.

Now, I obviously made some statements in this post that were opinion-based, but I'm not putting a disclaimer after all of them. Just be respectful of me, guys. Don't tell me I'm a stupid prole for finding Bioshock's story enlightening, heartbreaking, and thought-provoking. Was it Sandman? No. But it's the best you're going to get from video games.

Also, bear in mind that I've found video game stories to be largely retarded over the span of my life. What Bioshock does is a rare thing.

[Pantechnicon]

18 month bump owing to the fact that budgetary constraints makes me more of a Platinum Hits type of gamer when it comes to my 360. Thus I just picked up a copy of Bioshock a few days ago and have to give my own hearty recommendation to it.

Doing a little research into what title I'd like buy "next" was what led me to look into this one. Truth be told, I might have never become interested in Bioshock, dismissing it in my own mind as just another super-graphics FPS. What piqued my interest in the game was the discovery that the setting for the game drew large amounts of inspiration from the writings of Ayn Rand and her philosophy of Objectivism. I read my first Rand book (Anthem) at the age of 16 and, for all intents and purposes, Objectivism became my religion until I became a Christian at the age of 24. So the ability to play a game actually expressing these principles (whether critically of favorably, and so far I think the game leans toward the former) was not something I felt I should deny doing so Bioshock went to the top of the next-title list.

Reading back through this thread (an unwittingly the spoilers) I was surprised to see that no one had yet mentioned the Objectivism angle, as I just assume there are a few devotees of Ayn Rand knocking around the boards. I really don't consider myself that much of an adherent to these principles anymore, as my faith has made me more into what the Objectivists would derisively call an "altrusitic mystic". Still, Objectivism's influence on my early life is undeniable, thus I would recommend Bioshock for anyone intrigued (favorably or not) by Rand's work as a cathartic means of exploring a society trying to operate in accord with her ideals.

[TheDomesticInstitution]

18 month bump owing to the fact that budgetary constraints makes me more of a Platinum Hits type of gamer when it comes to my 360. Thus I just picked up a copy of Bioshock a few days ago and have to give my own hearty recommendation to it.

I'm a budget gamer myself and I've been meaning to pick this up for a while. I know it's $29.99 at Walmart, and it'll be the next PS3 game I get. It seems I'm always behind on the new releases, as I don't have the $60 it takes anytime something interesting is released. If it's anywhere as good as any of the Orange Box episodes, I'll be happy. I hope I'm not setting my bar to high.

[calthaer]

I'm about halfway through this, I think, but haven't had the time over the last month or two to really pick it back up.

It's not boring, but it is System Shock 2. Very much System Shock 2. So I'm totally expecting someone to come out and say: "I USED THE <ANDREW RYAN> FORM TO E-E-E-ESTABLISH TRUST!" Or something of that nature.

The nice thing about SS2 was that you couldn't experience the whole game with just one play-through, because you had to make choices about skills. Bioshock lets you get almost all the skills that are really worth having. It's a bit better balanced than SS2 because you don't have one all-surpassing best weapon (a.k.a. the Assault Rifle), but still.

Bioshock also doesn't have multiplayer coop like SS2 eventually did. Major detriment.

[Ed Oscuro]

Well hell, I'll pipe in. I've played both games all the way through.

I didn't hate BioShock, but there is only one point in the game where I felt at home and very interested.

Weapons: SS2 - A lot of hilariously useless guns and the constant maintenance need ensures you spend your time wetting your pants that your gun is gonna break any minute. Very slow but tense gameplay; every last decision feels important. Not a lot of stuff to shoot early on, but that wasn't really the point. Bioshock: You can just pick up whatever you need and slog through it without a problem (or any real investment); your guns look far less durable than they did in SS2 but no matter, you can fire through 'em all day without a care (if you're like me, you never were far below maximum ammo for everything within at least the last quarter of the game). Wrench is all you need, aside from heavy weapons for taking out the BDs; the game never makes it particularly difficult unless you are incompetent in selecting powers. Never felt a moment of tension in the game except for the one crazy guy's orchestra of death thing (which had a few neat ideas).

General feel: I dunno, SS2 has this interesting balance of super cheese and gut-wrenching (well, not literally) terror; the generic 90s scifi shooter locations have a rather interesting patina of nasty smeared all over them: compare to later games like the original Red Faction. Bioshock has a lot of faux-deco and grainy clip art all over the place. Got really stale, really quick. The only parts of the game I thought interesting visually were the very first area and the gardens (which had a very heavy SS2 feel about them, even some of the classic SS2 menace in puzzles and even reused sounds - very nice touches indeed. Felt like the game's one bright flash of brilliance to me). Monster quips are not nearly as interesting, although they tried to make them more so ("I obey all his commaannnddddmmennnnnts!" eh?) - plot lines were much better.

Storyline: I found the game-long rant against Randian Objectivism somewhat funny, and the story lines that go along with this are probably the most artistically competent stuff of the series (aside from the aforementioned beloved SS2 cheese). There are some pretty ridiculous rough / silly spots, but I'll take them if it means there's good stuff to go along with it.

I considered that the problem might be that years of games that do tense gunplay well have changed my expectations of what a game should be; but I don't think so. The fact that the plot is basically SS2 reworked to be more "intellectual" and less a gut punch (as it was in SS2, innnnsect) didn't matter much to me either. Basically, it wasn't fun to fight the enemies and it wasn't really tense either, when I was never scared to knock them upside the head with a wrench (unlike SS2 where a large number of enemies were deadly wads of meat, blew up on contact, or something like that). Maybe I've gotten good enough that SS2 wouldn't be any trouble to me now, I dunno.

Interesting point: The main character's name is Jack Ryan, so this could be seen as a dig at the basis of what many people say is conservative propaganda veiled as military fiction - the Tom Clancy series. In light of all that shortening the game's name to "BS" seems not to be a dig at the game itself.


If it's anywhere as good as any of the Orange Box episodes, I'll be happy. I hope I'm not setting my bar to high.
I would say you are. All of the OB single-player games have been excellent in managing challenge and tension; they've been some of the best games yet. Bioshock is "just another game" in my view.

All said I'm looking forward to the next BioShock; here's hoping that a better physics system (i.e. one that works a bit more like TimeShift, a contemporary of BioShock, I believe; with the awesome looks and exploding bodies) will be coupled with more compelling gameplay, along with a few other tweaks.

[whoisKeel]

Meh. The atmosphere was great. The plot twist was predictable.

The game rewards you for dying (full life, keep your items). There is all this cool stuff you can do like hack cameras, make the bid daddy's work for you, electrocute the water to kill bosses...but it's all optional (and repetitive)...shooting "halo style" is just as effective.

Anybody that claims that the "choice" was difficult is a moron. Very obviously you will get cooler weapons and a better ending by making the "right" choice. There is no benefit to making the "wrong" choice (more stuff earlier), since dying is the most strategic option anyways... (big daddy's don't get their life back)

Too bad they ruined the coolest potential of the game with an escort mission (guess what game developers: most gamers hate escorting helpless victims).

Worth playing for the atmosphere, but the gameplay is average.

[NayusDante]

Objectivism is... weird. Bioshock is a portrait of Objectivism executed half-heartedly, at best. If Ryan truly wanted a free market, let the smugglers import. When they have to smuggle in the HOLY BIBLE, you have a dictatorship on your hands. At least they had money laying around everywhere, Ayn Rand would be proud. That was all that seemed to matter to her, seeing as she was literally buried in it. In that sense, I suppose the game IS a realistic representation of Objectivism.

I honestly don't know what to think of Bioshock. When I played the demo, I had this impression that it was just that, a demo of the game. I expected more gameplay, more nuanced interactivity. The sad truth was the opposite, as they actually put more things in the demo so you see the entire scope of the game. All that you're missing in the demo is "story" and length.

I put story in quotes because almost nothing happens through the course of the game. By the time you get to Rapture, everything of note has happened. There's two events in the game that result in anything different at the end from how it starts: Ryan's death and freeing/recruiting the little sisters. Ryan has seen his failure, and would probably have killed himself anyway. The fate of the little sisters is variable, and only plugs the sequel. Aside from that, you kill splicers. There's a few "boss battles," but the only differences with those are that they have more dialog. They don't advance the story. There's no story to advance.

Granted, I haven't played System Shock 2 yet (it's sitting in my to-do stack). Still, when I heard Bioshock had ties to ex Ion Storm devs, I immediately thought of Deus Ex. Deus Ex is what I consider to be the greatest PC game ever made, so my expectations were high. I expected more RPG-like character progression, an INVOLVING story, etc.

The plasmids just didn't seem to help all that much. Sure, it's neat to pretend that you're The Pain and cover everyone in bees, then electrocute them, but it gets old after a while. That said, playing it purely as a shooter is actually pretty satisfying. Then you get to a big daddy and you have to choose to either empty all your ammo into him, or use a few plasmids and STILL empty all your ammo into him. In most situations, shooting is the quickest and most efficient means of progression, with the plasmids seeming only good to break up the monotony.

Level design seems to cancel out the decent gunplay. It doesn't feel like an underwater city, it feels like an FPS. Putting a bathroom here or an appartment there doesn't forgive linear areas. Forcing you to backtrack through an area to get back to where you're heading isn't an open world.

I really liked the art-deco style, as sparsely used as it was. The sound design was also rather good, with things like the jump landing sounding heavy, like a reaction to my actions rather than a canned sound. The voice acting was excellent, I just wish there were more of it at regular intervals.

As for the endings, neither one seemed any good. Like Yahtzee said, your choice is reduced to either "Mother Theresa or baby-eating," with no middleground. Fallout 3 had a weak story, but at least it accomodates a neutral ending. Then again, Fallout 3's story involves things happening, like characters dying and things being left in a different condition than they started.

Since the game is a better shooter than anything else, I'd play it on PC. I did use my 360 pad, and it felt alright until the final battle, but it's the kind of game you can play on the couch and not be fully focused on. It's probably cheaper on PC too, so get some RAM with the difference. If you don't have a GeForce 7600/Radeon X800 or better, you might want to stick with a console. It's definitely worth playing once, maybe twice, but beyond that it just isn't that profound.

While it's not that important, the running gag of Ion Storm games using 0451 for the first lock code was pretty much killed in Bioshock. There's like, three combination locks in the game. You don't find the first one (0451) until about halfway in. For a game set only a few years after its initial publication, they could have made more Fahrenheit 451 references, and it might have added to the opressive atmosphere.

If the sequel is just more of the same, I'll skip it. If it's actually a deeper game with more exploration and story, I'd be first in line.

[Ed Oscuro]

Agh how did I get back into this topic (selected the wrong tab, posted a reply for another topic, but I had some more thoughts)

Anyway, I agree with Keel - there didn't seem to be any great benefit to the evil way of doing things. Sure there's three endings, but you basically get two bad endings for being shitty.

Agreed with NayusDante about the level design being an impediment to gunplay - you're obviously supposed to duck and cover behind the many columns a lot, but generally there's few places to get a good vantage point on enemies. It would be easy to argue that was always an inescapable part of the setting (same as System Shock 2) but I think they might've overdone it here.