BioShock

BioShock is a video game that consists of 12 releases

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Would you kindly venture into the mysterious, Utopian city of Rapture and discover what exactly has gone wrong in this thrilling first-person epic?

Overview

Bioshock is inspired by Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged. At the time of release Bioshock was lauded by critics for its peerless storytelling and fascinating story. Bioshock uses audio diaries to advance the story. These diaries follow different characters through the rise and fall of the city of Rapture. At times ghosts also appear in the city showing very brief segments of certain citizens of Rapture. Bioshock also is well known for not taking player control away during scripted events.

The player doesn't directly see any of this coup in BioShock. Instead, you arrive sometime afterward, discovering a desolate city filled with insane, drug-addled people. You hear about Rapture's golden era--and the events that led to its demise--through a series of audio logs that serve as diary entries for the past inhabitants of the city. Touted by 2K as an "FPS-RPG" and a "spiritual sequel" to Irrational's highly revered System Shock 2. It has gameplay similarities to both System Shock games as well as Deus Ex. It is possibly an indictment of the current gaming generation that BioShock has been lauded as such an original game, when in fact it copies so many structural elements from said predecessors gameplay (non-linear player-character development, moral choice in plot progression, immersive setting and story).

To its credit though, BioShock is more of an exploration-focused first-person shooter that makes streamlined, simplified use of some of its predecessors' mechanics, such as the use of audio logs as a storytelling device, a hacking minigame, and special abilities. BioShock is one of the first games to be produced using Epic's Unreal Engine 3 and appeared on both the Xbox 360 and the PC. In recent months a PlayStation 3 version of the game has been announced, which will feature a new 'Survivor' difficulty mode as well as other in game add on content downloadable "challenge rooms" will also be available, these put the player in a race against the clock while working through brief, puzzle-oriented levels. The Playstation 3 version will also ship with Trophy Support

Plot Synopsis

No Gods or Kings. Only Man.

Set in 1960, BioShock begins with a plane crash, with the player character, named Jack, being the only survivor. The player takes refuge in a lone lighthouse in the middle of the ocean. A bathysphere leads down into the bowels of the underwater city of Rapture. A message from the city's creator, Andrew Ryan, talks of his vision for Rapture, a utopia without ethical or moral barriers. However, from the looks of things, Ryan has failed in realizing his vision.

A man named Atlas contacts Jack in the bathysphere and helps to lead him through the city, which is filled with genetically modified Splicers, Little Sisters, and their guardians, the Big Daddies. Atlas also tells Jack about ADAM, stem cells harvested to enhance the abilities of the human body. The abuse of ADAM has driven the Splicers mad and the material is what the Little Sisters constantly search for throughout Rapture.

Atlas instructs Jack to kill the Little Sisters and take the ADAM from them in order to use special abilities called Plasmids. However, another ally in Rapture, Dr. Tenenbaum, tells Jack to save the Little Sisters and promises to reward him if he obeys.

Atlas soon tells Jack of his wife and child, who are hiding from Splicers in a submarine. When Jack reaches them, however, Andrew Ryan destroys it, supposedly killing Atlas' family. Atlas, enraged, asks Jack to kill Andrew Ryan.

Jack reaches Andrew Ryan, who reveals that Jack is actually his son and was born in rapture two years prior. Genetic modification allowed for him to age rapidly. One of Rapture's pioneers, Frank Fontaine, "programmed" Jack to obey any order uttered with the phrase "Would you kindly", a phrase that Atlas has repeated many times. Jack was the one who crashed the plane and was brought to Rapture on purpose, with the goal of killing Andrew Ryan.

Ryan orders Jack to kill him, using the phrase "Would you kindly." Forced to obey, Jack kills Ryan with a golf club. Shortly after, Atlas reveals himself to be Frank Fontaine and leaves Jack to die in the city. Dr. Tenenbaum saves him, though, and deactivates the "Would you kindly" trigger phrase control Fontaine has over him. Jack then proceeds to Olympus Heights and finds Lot 192 which reverses a heart stopping mental control Fontaine was attempting to kill Jack with. Tenenbaum then instructs Jack to don a Big Daddy suit so the Little Sisters can lead him to Fontaine. When he reaches him, Fontaine, pumped up by massive quantities of ADAM, has acquired almost superhuman abilities.

Upon defeating Fontaine, three endings are possible. If the player rescues all the Little Sisters, the game ends with Jack and the Little Sisters leaving Rapture and the girls growing up to live their lives. If the player harvested two or more, but not all the Little Sisters, Jack kills the Little Sisters and takes their ADAM. If the player harvests all of the Little Sisters, the same ending is shown but with Tenenbaum's narration being angrier.

Andrew Ryan and Bioshock

Most of the gamers believe Bioshock is a game exclusively about Andrew Ryan and not the playable character , all the events in Bioshock are about a set of ambitious ideas that caused a war and therefore had negative impact on the city of Rapture . Bioshock is nothing without Andrew Ryan and here is the reason

I am Andrew Ryan, and I'm here to ask you a question. Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? 'No!' says the man in , 'It belongs to the poor.' 'No!' says the man in the , 'It belongs to God.' 'No!' says the man in , 'It belongs to everyone.' I rejected those answers; instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible. I chose... Rapture, a city where the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, Where the great would not be constrained by the small! And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well.

What is the difference between a man and a parasite? A man builds, a parasite asks 'Where's my share?' A man creates, a parasite says 'What will the neighbors think?' A man invents, a parasite says 'Watch out, or you might tread on the toes of God...'"

"It was not impossible to build Rapture at the bottom of the sea, it was impossible to build it anywhere else."

"Doctor Suchong, frankly, I'm shocked by your proposal. If we were to modify the structure of our commercial plasmid line as you propose, to have them make the user vulnerable to mental suggestion through pheromones, would we not be able to effectively control the actions of the citizens of Rapture? Free will is the cornerstone of this city. The thought of sacrificing it is abhorrent. However... we are indeed in a time of war. If Atlas and his bandits have their way, will they not turn us into slaves? And what will become of free will then? Desperate times call for desperate measures."

"On the surface, the Parasite expects the doctor to heal them for free, the farmer to feed them out of charity. How little they differ from the pervert who prowls the streets, looking for a victim he can ravish for his grotesque amusement."

"A man chooses, a slave obeys."

"I believe in no God, no invisible man in the sky. But there is something more powerful than each of us, a combination of our efforts, a Great Chain of industry that unites us. But it is only when we struggle in our own interest that the chain pulls society in the right direction. The chain is too powerful and too mysterious for any government to guide. Any man who tells you different either has his hand in your pocket, or a pistol to your neck."

Gameplay

Weapons

Gunning it with a Big Daddy.

The game features an array of traditional weapons that can be acquired throughout the game. The player carries all of the weapons at once, so all of the weapons are available at any time. Each weapon can be upgraded twice, using special kiosks called "Power to the People" machines. Each weapon can also carry three types of ammunition. The weapons in the game are as follows:

Wrench: A simple melee weapon acquired at the beginning of the game.
Pistol: A standard six-shooter. The first firearm acquired.
Machine Gun: An automatic weapon that holds a large number of bullets.
Shotgun: A close-range weapon that packs quite a punch.
Grenade Launcher: A large weapon that can be upgraded to fire different kinds of explosives such as heat seeking rpgs.
Chemical Thrower: it fires various substances like napalm, liquid nitrogen, and electrical gel.
Crossbow: A long-range weapon best used against single opponents.
Research Camera: This "weapon" allows you to research various enemies and gain bonuses on damage and acquire various tonics.

Plasmids

Plasmids change your character's genetic information and provide him with specific abilities. A substance called EVE is needed to use these abilities. EVE is found in hypodermic needles, called Hypos in the game, carried by the character and it can be acquired from enemies and bought. Plasmids are both found throughout the game and bought from the Gatherer's Garden Kiosk. The Plasmids in the game are as follows:

Cyclone: Places a cyclone on the floor. Used as a trap for enemies.
Electro Bolt: Shoots electricity at enemies. Can also be used to disable security cameras, turrets, and bots.
Enrage: Turns a Splicer near you on other Splicers.
Hypnotize Big Daddy: Turns a Big Daddy into an ally.
Incinerate: Shoots fire at enemies.
Insect Swarm: Shoots a swarm of bees at enemies.
Security Bullseye: Alerts security to the presence of your enemies.
Targeting Dummy: Creates a decoy for your enemies to attack.
Telekinesis: Allows you to use movable objects as weapons by flinging them through the air (such as an enemy grenade).
Winter Blast: Shoots a blast of ice that freezes enemies, and can be used on turrets, cameras, and bots to slow down the water for hacking.
Sonic Boom: Added in the downloadable content release, Sonic Boom allows the player to shoot a large blast of wind at enemies.

Tonics

Tonics upgrade your character and his abilities. Tonics are placed into slots, of which there are three types: Combat, Engineering, and Physical. The Gene Bank machine is used to place tonics into various slots.

Hacking

Hacking in BioShock.

Performing hacks on various machines in the game can make things a lot easier. Everything from security bots to safes can be hacked. Hacking machines can help you evade security systems, supply you with hidden items, and give you discounts on items at vending machines.

Hacking is done with the hacking mini-game, which is highly reminiscent of the classic computer game Pipe Mania (Pipe Dream in the United States). The goal is to successfully move fluid through a tube set on a grid of tiles from a starting location to and ending location, both of which are just outside the grid and, thus, not modifiable by the player. The player reveals pieces of the tube one at a time and may swaps tiles to continue the tube and keep the fluid moving. If the fluid is hindered in its progress either due to player error or by hitting certain tiles such as overload tiles and security tiles, the mini-game is failed and, depending on the gravity of the failure, security bots may be deployed to eliminate the player. An auto-hack tool can allow for a hack without using the mini-game. Hacking ability is greatly enhanced and simplified through the strategic equipment of certain engineering tonics. Also, The Winter Blast plasmid used on a machine just before hacking will slow the progress of the fluid considerably.

Vending Machines/Kiosks

Various vending machines and kiosks are found throughout the game. The different types are as follows:

Circus of Value: A place to purchase a variety of items. Ammo, first aid kits, and EVE Hypos are all available here.
Ammo Bandito: A vending machine that supplies ammunition.
Gatherer's Garden: This vending machine allows you to use collected ADAM to purchase Plasmids and Tonics.
Gene Bank: This machine allows you to customize your character, switching Plasmids and Tonics.
Power to the People: This machine allows you customize weapons. Each individual machine can only be used once.
U-Invent: This machine allows you to combine different items to create more helpful ones.

Vita-Chambers

Whenever your HP reaches zero, you "respawn" at the nearest vita-chamber, large man-sized tubes scattered throughout Rapture. Vita-Chambers serve as a checkpoint of sorts, even though the game can also be saved at any time through the start menu. Unlike traditional checkpoints, enemies injured or killed since reaching the Vita-Chamber will remain so when the player is respawned. However, weapon ammunition will remain at the same level as when the player was killed and the player is also given only a fraction of his maximum health. Since there is seemingly no penalty for using Vita-Chambers (unless you are trying to unlock certain achievements on the Xbox 360) many players have bemoaned this design decision for making the game too easy — given enough time and patience, a player wielding only the wrench can slog his or her way through even the toughest battles.

Moral Choice

Little Sister

BioShock is unusual in that it offers players a moral choice. Near the beginning of the game, the player is given the choice of either harvesting the Little Sisters (effectively killing them) to gain a large amount of ADAM, or rescuing the Little Sisters for a significantly smaller amount of ADAM. Rescuing Little Sisters will, however, allow the player to access certain plasmids and Xbox 360 achievements unavailable through the "evil" method of play, and for each 3 that you rescue you will receive a "gift" from Dr. Tenebuam. Depending on exactly how many Little Sisters you harvest or rescue, the game's ending is affected. If you save all the little girls, you get a one hundred point achievement for it. If you kill them all, you get enough Adam to buy all the plasmids and optional equipment you may need.

System Requirements

As displayed on the back cover of the box

Minimum Requirements

CPU (Processor): Pentium 4 2.4GHz Single Core processor
System RAM: 1GB
GPU (Video Card): Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 128MB RAM (NVIDIA 6600 or better/ATI X1300 or better, excluding ATI X1550).
Sound Card: 100% direct X 9.0c compatible sound card
HDD (Hard Disc) space: 8GB free space

Recommended Requirements

CPU (Processor): Intel Core 2 Duo processor

System RAM: 2GB

GPU (Video Card): DX9 - Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 512MB RAM (NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT or better) / DX10 - NVIDIA GeForce 8600 or better

Sound Card: Sound Blaster X-Fi series (Optimized for use with Creative Labs EAX ADVANCED HD 4.0 or EAX ADVANCED HD 5.0 compatible sound cards)

Downloadable content:

Xbox 360:

On Dec 4th, 2K games released a patch as well as Downloadable content for Xbox 360 fixing some known bugs and adding some features:

Xbox 360 patch/title update:

Added widescreen option: Horizontal FOV
Fix for rare case where a partial cache is not cleared
Increased Atlas’ volume in German
Fix for GUI sounds not playing during heavy action
Fix for not being able to take picture of Cobb in Rec
Possible fix for pauses or hangs when opening flash bink movies
Fix for switching difficulty breaking achievement
Fix for small texture streaming bug
Fix for rare hang when a lot of things are going on at once

Xbox 360 Downloadable content:

Added Disable Vita Chamber option
Plasmid Pack is included in this DLC (Machine Buster 1 & 2, Vending Expert 1 & 2, Sonic Boom 1 & 2, EVE Saver)
100 point achievement for beating game without Vita Chamber called "Brass Balls"
How to do it:
Must beat game on Hard
Must not use a Vita Chamber (you can always roll back to an earlier save)
The Vita Chamber Disabled option can be on or off as long as you don’t resurrect

PlayStation 3:

The PlayStation 3 contains all the updates of the Xbox 360 version plus:

PlayStation 3 ( 20th November 2008) patch:

UPDATE - The patch was released by accident on 13th of November 2008, but was quickly pulled off)

Enables Add On Content functionality for the Challenge Rooms and New Game Plus
Add-On Content required to use this functionality
Big Daddy Bounce, Elite Bouncer, and Other Textures Appeared Pixelated
Fix for an issue where large blocky pixels would show up whenever viewing the Bouncer and Elite Bouncer variants of the Big Daddy. Also fixes various other texture pixelation including weapons.

White Bars
Fix for an issue where white/discolored bars would show up at the right and bottom sides of the screen during the plane crash / water scene at the beginning of the game.

Dark Big Daddy After Resurrection
Fix for an issue where Big Daddy would occasionally turn black after the player dies and is then resurrected.

Shrinking Fire Particles
Fix for an issue where some fire particles would shrink every time they were retriggered.

Big Daddies Gushing Abnormal Amounts of Blood
Fix for an issue where Big Daddies would gush abnormal amounts of blood after being killed by a critical hit while having more than 10% health (ie, from another Big Daddy’s gun).

PS Button Crash
Fix for an issue where the game would crash when PS button hit during hacking when vsync turned to off

Rare Hang
Fix for a rare issue where the game would hang caused by a deadlock between the renderer, havok, and the main game threads.

Incorrect Water Fog Rendering
Fix for an issue where reflective water would sometimes be rendered with incorrect fog colors.

Subtitles Not Disappearing After Audio Finishes
Fix for an issue where audio subtitles would occasionally not go away, even after the audio finished playing.

Menu UI Sounds Too Loud
Fix for an issue where menu sounds were too loud.

Unlocalized Autosave Message – NA ONLY
Fix for an issue where the autosave message wasn’t localized.

Some Localized Strings Were Too Long
Fix for several issues where localized strings were too long. This includes the ‘Cannot Carry:’ message, ammo name lengths, weapon name lengths, and the Location in Fisheries ‘Upper Freezer’.

Hang After Dying While Using Combination Lock – NA ONLY
Fix for an issue where the game would hang if the player dies while using a combination lock with the Vita-Chamber option off.

PlayStation 3 Downloadable content - Challenge Rooms:

A Shocking Turn of Events – A Little Sister is trapped atop a Ferris wheel in an undisclosed location in Rapture. Using only the tools and environment around them, players must use their wits to create electricity to power the Ferris wheel and bring the Little Sister to safety.

The I in Team – Using limited resources, and an even more limited arsenal, players must negotiate traps and find a way to defeat a Big Daddy using their wits instead of raw firepower.

Worlds of Hurt – Step up and take on the most grueling challenge offered in the world of Rapture. Players must battle through eight rooms of Big Daddies, Splicers and the worst that Rapture has to offer. Accumulate Adam, build an arsenal of Plasmids, Tonics and Weaponry, and fight through to rescue the Little Sister.

In addition to these three Challenge Rooms, we have two special additions to this package. First, anyone who downloads the Challenge Rooms will also receive the Official Premium BioShock Theme. Second, purchasers will gain access to a new feature, New Game Plus.

WHAT IS NEW GAME PLUS?

New Game Plus allows players who have beaten the main game the ability to start a new game with the character data (weapons, inventory, research, etc.) carried over from the end of the game (if you beat the game after the patch was installed) or from a saved game of your choosing (if you beat the game before the patch was installed.) When you install the Add-On Content, a "New Game Plus" option will appear on the menu screen allowing you to use this feature.

Xbox 360 Game Installation

BioShock requires 6.1GB of space to install on an Xbox 360 HDD.

General Information Edit

Game Name	BioShock
Platform(s)	Xbox 360 PlayStation 3 PC
Publisher(s)	Spike Co., Ltd. 2K Games
Developer(s)	Digital Extremes 2K Boston 2K Australia 2k Marin
Genres	Add a new genre Action Adventure First-Person Shooter
Themes	Add a new theme Horror Sci-Fi Alternate Historical
Original US Release	Aug. 21, 2007 need a fuzzy date?
Original US Release	know the real date?
Aliases	BS

Trivia

What was the literary source that inspired the storyline of Bioshock?

Atlas Shrugged
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Less Than Zero
The Fountainhead
1984

User Reviews

Platform	User Reviews	Avg. Score
All Reviews	97 reviews
Xbox 360	76 reviews
PlayStation 3	2 reviews
PC	19 reviews
Add your own user review

Associated News

Hands-On With BioShock PS3's Challenge Rooms
Find out more about what sort of gameplay your $10 will get you in this three-level pack coming on November 20th.

BioShock PS3 "Challenge Room" DLC Media, Date Released
The PlayStation 3-exclusive content is coming in two weeks. Check out this video walkthrough in the meantime.

BioShock PS3: It's Totally BioShock
BioShock is still awesome. And the PlayStation 3 version of the game seems to be equally awesome as its 360 and PC counterparts.

Yes, There Will Be Another BioShock Game
Take-Two slides some actual game news into the middle of its financial report, including a new BioShock game.

Videos

	BioShock DLC Walkthrough Check out one of the three levels in the PS3-exclusive Challenge Rooms pack.
	BioShock PS3 Trailer Remember BioShock? Here it is on the PlayStation 3.