Game Review: Bioshock (Xbox360)

Decisions, Decisions...

Outline

You play as an unnamed individual (possibly named Jack) who is flying to an, er, unknown location for an unknown reason. However, something goes wrong and the plane crashes into the ocean off the shore of a large building. As the only survivor you find yourself in an underwater city named RAPTURE; a so-called safe haven for great (boarder-line insane) individuals who can better themselves without the restrictions of morality, humanity and all that other silly stuff.
Enter genetic modification and ultra-cool weaponry... but ignore the homicidal maniacs (once genius') whom roam and live throughout eerie RAPTURE.

However, there is trouble afoot - as, seemingly, one of the few sane individuals left around, you believe that you are the one to save everyone and, with the help of Atlas - your ally and narrator, put a stop to the madness and such like.

Story

Don't let it's glossy visuals and frightening setting fool you. This is a story driven game. It covers somewhat philosophical issues in a very surreal setting; our choices, fate, control, power, truth, the greater good... all of these issues are posed to the gamer and actively seek to allow them to make choices which pose yet more questions.
To begin with there is the choice of either saving or harvesting the numerous Little Sisters whom walk RAPTURE seeking dead bodies to which they can extract ADAM (where harvesting them gives you more ADAM and saving them...less); a substance required to survive - or at least feed a strange sort of addiction. ADAM is also used by you, the gamer, to improve your character; adding PLASMIDS and other nuggets of variables which will make you stronger and more powerful. It soon comes apparent that you must close your eyes to your own morality to essentially destroy it - just one of the many fantastic issues this game poses you with. Having completed the game, looking back over it and reading articles discussing it's conclusion, it comes apparent that this game is a fantastic story FIRST AND FOREMOST and a brilliant action/RPG second. In fact, even though the action itself was brilliant, it still filled in the gaps between each 'story-point' - as opposed to it being the other way round.

Gameplay

Gameplay just falls short of the Story aspect of the game, mainly because there wasn't as much emphasis on having a choice that actively changed or influenced the game. You're given 2 endings depending on what actions you took during the game (I won't say how you get one or the other..) but other than that it was very much more about how you decided to deal with situations that opposed you. Although it perhaps should have, at no point during the game did I feel that it had become repetitive even due to the amount of 'clone' enemies; this is perhaps due to each 'clone' having a different personality - they all seemed to be doing something different, having conversations (which, also, never seemed to repeat) with each other...For instance, at one point a grenade Splicer (he throws explosives at things, people..) attacked me and ran away. I tried to take him down with some range weapons but his grenades were slowing me down (throwing them over his shoulder with great precision); I then decided to use my Telekineses plasmid to catch his grenades and throw them back, but he was too agile. Eventually I followed him into a room I had already been in, with various dead splicers scattered around the floor. The room was empty apart from the dead bodies; he was nowhere to be found... I walked forward and the lights started to flicker, the door behind me shut closed and I heard laughing. I turned around to see a spider splicer on the celling and then the room went black and I was attacked, the lights came on and I made for the door but to my surprise the 'dead' splicers rose up and began attacking me..
After this encounter, and after I had died, I thought to myself; what an amazing sequence of events, scripted or not, it was truly amazing to participate in: being led into a trap, evidently, which lent itself to a very cinematic perspective.
These sorts of situations happen many times during the course of the game and all-but-add to the already impressive enemy A.I; Houdini Splicers whom attack you, disappear and reappear behind you. Spider Splicers, who will jump to the ceiling and drop down right in front of you for an up-close-and-personal attack. The diversity of combat and the options available to the player make this initially generic shooter an ideal playground for fans of playing devils advocate.

Graphics

This isn't as much a selling point as the other aspects of a game are to me, but nevertheless this is a beautiful game. However, I don't think it matches GoW (Gears of War) when it comes to the aesthetic presentation; it's not quite to that standard. But it's the next best thing...
This is perhaps the first game (certainly the first FPS) that I've literally 'walked-thru', when running is perhaps the most obvious choice. Of course, that's not counting the times I've ran away from something or towards someone, but generally when I was exploring I was just walking, listening to my footsteps and anyone elses and just taking it all it; the environment, the shadows, and so on - as what this has over GoW is atmosphere boat loads and buckets full of atmosphere. So although the graphics on a scale of 1 to 10 aren't matching GoW standards, they are used more effectively - the setting and level design is brilliant, open and enclosed at the same time; I, on more than one occasion, would find a corner of a room just so I knew that nothing was coming up behind me. Not, really, because I was scared or such, but because I was hanging on to my life by a thread, or because I only had one more anti-personal bullet left.
Since we're underwater it was only right that the design team at 2kgames got the water right, and they sure did. Whether it be cracking glass, dripping from rusted pipes or exploding through hatches it was truly beautiful. It was also a huge aspect of gameplay too; several enemies sludging through knee deep in water? Zap them with the electric plasmid. Or, if you've set a Splicer on fire he'll more than likely actively seek out some puddles to jump in to extinguish himself; hilarity ensured.

Conclusion

The best game I've played on the 360... period. It's perhaps not as large as Oblivion or as pretty as GoW. But what this doesn't have in quantity and gloss it makes up for in Gameplay and immersion. It's only downfall is that once you've completed it you'll not be itching to play again, I will be trading it in for money off (PES 2008, Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed - one of them) as it doesn't have the replayability of some other titles. However, this is not a negative aspect. In fact it's a refreshing and, perhaps, more classy alternative. Like a good movie, perhaps you don't want to play it again straight away, but you'll be damned you if you don't remember it 5-10-15 years down the line, and when you see it for £5 a pop you'll be grabbing it with both hands and taking it on again, hoping that you don't remember the twists and turns of this fabulous game.