Bioshock

Since the game came out 2 years ago I was always hearing about how great of a game Bioshock was. All I knew that it was a first person shooter and that it was good and it won game of the year. Had to be a good game right? Boy was it good. As my last post said, I was lucky enough to come across a copy of the game on PC for only $5, coincidentally I recently got a new laptop that had great gaming capabilities and allowed me to run the game on its full settings. Awesome.

Well, I went through a bit of trouble installing the game, mainly because I installed it during school during a study hall. I should have read the installation guide telling me that I needed an internet connection to be able to install it, unfortunately I was in my school's band room. I had to go through the trouble of finding a teacher cool enough to let me use the internet from one of the class computers and use it on my laptop. Voila, I got the game running, I launched the game with high expectations and an open mind.

I was blown away. This didn't stop any time soon. This is an awesome shooter, with some RPG elements that add spice to the game without turning it into a all out RPG shooter like Fallout 3 is.

In Bioshock, you play as Jack you're on a plane and it crashes into the ocean, you manage to survive the crash and swim onto an island. You're smart enough to go into strange mysterious doors and before you know it you're in a submarine to the underwater city of Rapture. You are in an unknown world and don't know what to do. Fortunately a man named Atlas manages to reach you via radio and asks of your help. You are asked to help him rescue his family that is lost in Rapture. This would seem like an easy task if all of the citizens of Rapture hadn't been turned into crazy, deranged, killers out to get you. Despite the fact you're in a city of lunatics, there is indeed a ruler, Andrew Ryan runs the city, mainly because he is the man with all of the ADAM.

Bioshock basically revolves around ADAM, a substance that genetically mutates and rearranges people's genetic make up giving them amazing powers in the form of plasmids and gene tonics. Plasmids work alot like magic, it uses something called Eve and it works just like an MP bar in RPGs. Plasmids are primarily used offensively, some being electroshock and incinerate. Electroshock zaps your enemies with electricity stunning them for a certain amount of time allowing you to get an easy head shot or hit them with your wrench. Incinerate sets your opponents on fire, and I think the telekinesis plasmid is rather self explanatory.
Gene tonics on the other hand, have permanent effects on you, just as long as you have it equipped on you. (I'm not sure if equipped would be the right word, but it's the basic idea) Gene tonics help you in various ways and are categorized in three branches: Physical, Combat, and Engineering tonics. Physical gene tonics helps in ways such that medical kits heal you more, eve hypos regenerate more eve, food and drink around Rapture you consume restore more health; physical gene tonics can even make you run faster, become invisible, and even help you get more money. Combat tonics on the other hand are rather self explanatory, they help you in combat; this could include more damage resistance, stronger wrench swings, or even setting opponents of fire or freezing them if they melee you. I will get into engineering tonics shortly.

Throughout Rapture, you will see automated turrets, security cameras, drones, locked vaults, and electric locks. All of these can be hacked to your advantage, you can hack turrets to shoot enemies instead of you, security cameras to send drones against enemies, have drones attack enemies, unlock vaults, and unlock some doors. Other things that can be hacked are the vending machines and medical stations. Vending machines can be hacked to reduce the price of items and have more items in stock, and medical stations may be hacked so the price to heal is reduced and if enemies happen to heal themselves it instead kills them. Hacking is a mini game, you have to get a pipe flowing with water from point A to point B, if the water overflows than the machine short circuits thus hurting you, or it sends drones out (Hacking is alot like the game Pipe Mania http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipe_Dream_%28video_game%29). To add to the challenge of hacking, there are over load traps, alarm tiles, and acceleration tiles. Overload traps instantly make the thing you are hacking short circuit, alarm tiles sends drones against you and acceleration tiles makes the water move faster. Thankfully, hacking isn't the only option, you can also buy out the item you're hacking or use an auto hack tool, which hacks the item with no effort. If you don't have enough money to buy out something or have no auto hacks and hacking is your only option (though hacking is never really necessary, it sure makes things alot easier) this is where Engineering gene tonics come into play. Engineering gene tonics primarily help you when hacking or interacting with technology. Engineering tonics generally does something like reducing the difficulty of hacks, reducing the number of over load traps or alarm tiles, or reducing the number of supplies needed to invent something at U-Invent machines. (U-Invent machiens may also be hacked, these machines allow you to invent things like autohack tools or unique ammo that is hard to find.) Hacking is only going to be as big of a deal as you make it to be, you will regularly come across vending machines and safes that can be hacked, and it is hard to resist the call to treasure and reduced cost of ever so useful med kits and eve hypos.

Every weapon save for the wrench, camera, and plasmids have 3 different ammo types, each with a different effect. The pistol and machine gun for example have anti-personnel, armor piercing, and regular bullets. Anti-personnel is effect against other humans, armor piercing against robots, and regular bullets...well...they're regular. Other examples of something more unique would be a trap bolt which stick an arrow on the wall and then shoots a sort of grapple off the arrow creating a kind of trip wire that is flowing with electricity. Ammo types really change the flow of the game and further adds to the RPG element of the game.

Ok...ADAM, this stuff made people go crazy, this stuff made people strong, this stuff game them super powers. This stuff, makes Bioshock so awesome. ADAM is used to purchase genetic upgrades at the Gatherer's Garden, here you can buy new plasmids, gene tonics, and can raise your max health and eve. ADAM is obtained by harvesting or saving little sisters, these creepy little kids are perfectly harmless, they would be harmless if they weren't always guarded by Big Daddies. To get to the Little Sister, you need to get past the Big Daddy, these guys are STRONG and you'll have some trouble defeating them, luckily you have a rather large arsenal of weapons. (I wouldn't use your pistol here) Once you've defeated the Big Daddy, you have the option to harvest or save the Little Sister, harvesting her will result in instant gratification giving you 160 ADAM for each harvest, while saving a Little Sister on the other hand will only give you 80 ADAM. Though only receiving 80 ADAM, every 3 Little Sisters you rescue rewards you with additional ADAM, some rare ammo or items, and exclusive gene tonics and a plasmid only obtainable by saving Little Sisters. Harvesting or saving Little Sisters also effects the ending you get once you beat the game. (I've played through one and experienced the happy ending, it was a pretty happy ending.)
You can go through the game without harvesting or saving one Little Sister, but you'll definitely have a difficult time doing so.

The environment in Rapture is stunning. Outside windows, you can see the beauty of what used to be an underwater metropolis, but what is now reduced to ruin and chaos. There are 8 different districts that you traverse in Rapture, some looking a bit more like the other, some alot more unique, such as a forest where Rapture gets all of its oxygen or an entertainment area with bars, a music hall, etc. The different environments keep the game fresh and interesting (as opposed to the monotonous halls that look exactly the same in Fallout 3)

Something I enjoy alot about Bioshock, is that not only is it an FPS that has RPG elements, it also has horror element to it. At times ammo may become scarce and you'll be left only with your wrench, and a grenade launcher which you don't want to waste. You will also be scared out of your mind some times, my first experience with a Houdini Splicer scared the crap out of me, I see the shadow of an enemy around the corner, and when I turn, what do I see? Nothing, he disappeared, then he reappears behind me, I scream, almost drop my laptop and stop breathing for a second. There are always times in the game when you will be genuinely creeped out, and that's just awesome that they actually manage to scare you. It's not a "Ew, gross" kind of scared or a "something popped out of nowhere and screamed" scared, it's a psychological kind of scared. When you see shadows, and you hear the taunts of splicers, when the lights go off and you hear voices, or when enemies are playing dead.

When the enemies started playing dead, I was paranoid and shot every body on the ground out of paranoia, I lost alot of ammo, boy was that a bad idea.

Early on in the game, you run across a research camera. You'll find this camera to be indispensable later on in the game. The camera takes pictures of enemies (dur) but every picture you take of a certain enemy raises a bar that goes up for every picture. Once the bar is filled, you get some sort of bonus, this is usually a damage bonus to that kind of gene tonic. You can't just take pictures willy-nilly though, you need film to take pictures and pictures are also graded, so the higher grade you get the more the research bar is going to raise. If you don't take pictures you'll soon find it will take a clip of ammo to kill a single enemy.

I don't want to get into story, because in my opinion, it's rather hard to tell without giving away key plot points. The story is primarily told through radio messages and audio diaries scattered throughout the game.


Ok, so we all know Bioshock is a great game. I think it's great because of it's solid shooting, diverse setting, engaging story, wonderful integration of RPG and horror elements, and that the game can be played any way you want it to. (Stealth, gun slinger, tank, plasmid master,, etc.)



Gameplay : 10/10
It's just absolutely spectacular. For the sake of not being monotonous, just reread the review, it's basically all about the gameplay.

Story : 9/10
It's enticing, interesting, and makes the game worth while.

Visual Presentation : 10/10
The 50's feel of the game makes it charming. Though parts of the game feel waaay to similar to Fallout 3's cartoons*. (wow, I've referenced Fallout 3 alot in this review.)
The water effects are amazing and make sense since the game is underwater.

Lasting Appeal : 8/10
It's one of those games that you play through once and put away for a while, (thought you might play through again to experience the other ending) but then you pick it up again after a few months and re experience the awesome all over again.

Overall: 9.5/10 (not averaged or anything)
It's amazing, it's fun, it's scary, and it's diverse, you'll feel some sympathy, and you'll get mad. Bioshock won game of the year for a reason.





*If you thought, "Well...isn't Fallout copying Bioshock's cartoon pictures? Because Bioshock came out before Fallout 3."
No, not true, Fallout's cartoon icons have been around since the very first Bioshock that came out YEARS before Bioshock did.