Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7190 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Take 2
• Released on: 2007-08-24
• Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
• ESRB Rating: Adults Only
• Platform: Windows XP

Amazon.co.uk Preview
There aren’t many games which list a critique of objectivism as one of its selling points, but then Bioshock isn’t like other games. Indeed the only titles it can easily be compared to are System Shock and its sequel, to which this is a spiritual successor. Instead of being set in a derelict space ship though the game’s story involves you exploring a mysterious underwater city after a plane crash. The city had been created as an art deco paradise for the intellectual elite but is now in ruins and populated only by grotesque mutants – both physically and mentally.

Although at first sight the game appears to be a first person shoot ‘em-up it is not primarily an action game. Your goal is survival, not extermination, with ammunition limited and many enemies far more powerful than yourself. You are able to upgrade your abilities though, both physical and psychic, by collecting Adam – the mutagen which was the cause of the disaster in the first place. Even so the best way to defend yourself is to play the creatures and environments against themselves, tricking one group into fighting against another or taking control of security robots and devices.

The game gives you full freedom to play the game exactly as you want, while at the same time creating a living world which carries on with or without you – with many creatures not even bothering to acknowledge you unless you attack them. With stunning graphics, especially the water effects, and an extremely disturbing atmosphere this could well be the most intelligently macabre video game ever made.
HARRISON DENT

Manufacturer's Description
After your plane crashes into icy uncharted waters, you discover a rusted bathysphere and descend into Rapture, a city hidden beneath the sea.  Constructed as an idealistic society for a hand picked group of scientists, artists and industrialists, the idealism is no more. Now the city is littered with corpses, wildly powerful guardians roam the corridors as little girls loot the dead, and genetically mutated citizens ambush you at every turn. BioShock forces you to question the lengths to which you will go and how much of your humanity you will sacrifice...to save your own life.

Customer Reviews

Great Game - nightmare to get running
The game itself is excellent, but the copy protection stopped me from playing it for a day. Their support line was never answered and when emailing support as directed by the software you just wait 4 hours for an automatic reply saying that if there is a problem you should contact them again. Oh yeah, you can only install it a few times before you'll have to call that support number...

It's a shame as this really spoilt the game for me. Once it was working I've loved every minute of it.

Beware the manufacturers restrictions
Before buying this product look up carefully how restricive the publisher is being. At the moment (27th August 2007) you are only allowed to install it a maximum of 5 times (per PC) and on a maximum of 5 PCs. Want to replay it a couple of times in the future (as was the case for System Shock and SS 2)? Then you'll hit that limit and probably have to buy a new PC or a new copy of Bioshock. Upgrading your PC? There is no clear policy as to when it defines your PC as a new PC. Upgrading your processor (which changes its serial number) may well turn it in to a new PC - so may new hard drives, changes in memory etc. If the company closes down, you won't be able to install it anymore - effectively you are not buying this software but renting it. After reading the fine print and online information I've decided to do as the manual says and send it back to Amazon instead of installing it. I don't mind copy protection, I don't mind registration - I do dislike online only activation (though I can live with that) and I will not "buy" something and then have major restrictons placed on how I can use it.

Dissapointing
Boy, did I go through some trouble to get this game and oh boy, was I dissapointed. First my Amazon order failed to come through, then when I finally had it in my hands it refused to run.

Oh yes, that's the first big problem with Bioshock: a quick look at the official forums shows that there's a huge amount of people running into similar problems but they all seem to have different reasons which is not a good sign - Bioshock seems to be hyper sensitive - it doesn't like the anti-virus program AVG, needs the absolutely latest DirectX10 (the one on the DVD is apparantly not new enough when combined with certain Nvidia or ATI drivers), and also new graphic card drivers are wanted, or it conflicts with soundcard drivers, doesn't like certain codecs, etc. etc.

After about 4 days of intensive searching I discovered that Securom was the cause of the crashing - it had a corrupted install and I had to completely remove every trace of it, reboot, reinstall Bioshock, and then finally it worked.

When I finally got to play the game, it only took a few hours for me to discover some big flaws in the game already.

1. While the world is gorgeous, it's very linear which is a terrible shame for such a great setting.

2. splicers are just too easy and the way a whack of the wrench will kill them just as easily as using plasmids (which often doesn't kill them instantaneously anyway) it makes the whole plasmid system feel overkill

3. The world feels too artificial in its design - puddles of water in the right place, oil spots to put on fire, etc. It feels too constructed and takes away from the immersion of the world

4. The game is too simplistic in design - System Shock 1&2 were far deeper and gave you an inventory, etc. but in Bioshock, it seems all you can carry is money, ammo, plasmid injections and health injections. Can you say "dumbed down"?

There's far more, but in the end, Irrational went the wrong way by trying to tie a basic FPS to a great idea that is Rapture. A RPG would have been far more fitting. A game like Fall Out or Baldur's Gate combined with this story would have been a killer. But right now we have an average FPS with some RPG elements but not enough to make the game interesting.

Too linear, too simplistic and not enough balance. More opponents, tougher opponents, more unlinear areas, etc. - it would have made this game much better.