Second Opinion

Sir_Brizz: Gaming lately, especially on the PC, has become somewhat stagnant. It's been rare that you find games like Gears of War that, while they do not excel in any one specific area, they excel because of the synergy their parts exhibit. Bioshock is, finally, one of those games for the PC. Bioshock takes what can only be considered a smorgasbord of game styles and combines them into a perfectly atmospheric, perfectly designed game.

This, however, does not mean that Bioshock is perfect by any means. It is marred by technical flaws (though, on the whole, EXTREMELY minor), minor gameplay flaws and, probably most importantly, a few slight interface problems.

Technically, the game is not bad. There were only a few instances where I got killed because a small box was sitting behind me and I couldn't move backwards. I also had a problem that wasn't experience by anyone else on the staff, every time I loaded a level it would bring me in without any normal maps on meshes and I would have to wait, sometimes up to a minute, for them to stream in and apply. This wasn't much of a problem in the beginning levels, but by the end of the game, the complexity of the levels had grown to such a level that it seemed to happen any time I loaded a save (even after the game loaded). This was hardly a noticeable detractor, I would just wait until the level was done loading before beginning my play time and that seemed just fine to me. These issues aside, Bioshock is a very technically beautiful game. Its atmosphere was nailed entirely. Dark areas were dark enough, light areas were light enough and there wasn't a consistent overuse of either formula.

As far as the gameplay goes, I only had a few nags. For one, it seemed like getting shot was nearly unavoidable in the early stages of the game. I found myself using first aid kits faster than in Dungeon Siege at some parts. Later in the game, after you collect a few tonics and plasmids, it almost becomes pointless to do anything other than shock your opponent and beat them with the wrench for the bonuses it will give you. However, even at this stage it's nearly impossible to avoid getting shot. Big Daddies are sufficiently hard, as promised. In the first few levels you will likely expend nearly all of your ammo taking just one of these big guys down. However, again, by the end of the game, you can essentially take them down with almost no effort by setting traps out of electric rope and proximity mines. Also, the exploding buck in the shotgun does more damage to him than almost any other weapon you have. This makes the game seem easier when nearing the end. Another complaint I had was that hacking had gotten fairly boring by the end of the game. If the difficulty level was too high, I would simply use one of the many Autohack tools around to hack whatever it was just to get on with the game. These may seem like big complaints reading them here, however they were actually fairly minor in comparison to the entire gameplay experience. The number of plasmids and tonics, along with the number of weapons and ammo types, offers nearly endless gameplay combinations for whatever you would like. I found myself gravitating to Incinerate and shotgun early on in the game as my favored combination, but it didn't offer the same effect as Electro Bolt and wrench in most cases later on in the game, so I ended up forfeiting it.

By now, you've likely heard of the moral choice of harvesting or rescuing Little Sisters from their diseased state. This is really the only moral choice that affects the end game at all, and you are forced to make it at the moment you retrieve ADAM from the first Little Sister you encounter. Still, there is enough variety in choice that you don't feel like you are being pigeon-holed into any particular course of action. In one level, an important character let me go, but I was so ticked off at him that I murdered him on the spot. The effect of this was that I didn't meet him again later on in the game, which I found pretty neat.

The interface, perhaps, was the most flawed element in the game. About halfway through the game, you can start collecting items with which to invent ammo, plasmids and other story-driven items. Despite the fact that you are encouraged to find these items, you can't actually see how many of them you are carrying since the developers left out the inventory screen. At U-Invent stations where these items are built, they decided not to show you how much of that item you currently had, making it difficult to decide what you wanted. More often than not, I ended up building more of a particular ammo type than I could carry and they just dropped on the floor. My final complain with the interface is that, while weapons were always in consistent slots in your inventory, Plasmids were not. There was also no way to re-sequence them at Gene Banks or just in your inventory. Because of this, a scene about 3/4th of the way through the game completely screwed me up when it was over because my plasmids were all out of order from what I had been using since essentially the second level. However, notwithstanding this stuff the interface was simple enough in game, and had, for the most part, detailed enough information in your map screen.

Finally, the game is simply amazing. I was able to completely ignore my complaints with the game to play it. The world immerses you in a creepy and disturbing environment where just about everyone has gone completely insane from greed, power fame or whatever it may be. It succinctly highlights a world without law, and how the lack of some kind of law can completely turn the morality of a group of people south. Still, while the story is fairly intricate and full of twists and turns along the way, looking to it for a complex, deep and morally intriguing lesson or discussion is probably not wise. In all its intricacies, it is still fairly skin deep, likely in order to keep the casual players interested. All in all, though, you will find this a very refreshing romp through a disturbed environment that the developers completely nailed. Each aspect of the game, though flawed, melds perfectly to offer a great gaming experience. I would even go so far as to say that Bioshock is nearer an actual film-like experience than any game I have played.

So what is the final word? GET BIOSHOCK! You will not regret it. While my review may seem rather negative, it is only because the game is so well done that there is very little that to critique. It is perhaps the best game that has been released in the last 5 years, and is sure to entertain you for anywhere from 8 hours to 16 hours depending on how much exploration you want to do and how many story elements you are interested in finding (for the record, it took me 15, and I left out several interesting, but not important, areas in the last few levels). For me, someone who has found the length of single player games deplorable as of late, I found this a refreshing change and fulfilling game experience from beginning to end. If you've been looking for a lengthy and fulfilling game experience, look no further than here.

Even More Screenshots...