Tue, 21 Aug 2007 19:50:00
A coupe of hours with Bioshock (for Xbox 360)
Random thoughts on Bioshock so far (with one spoiler):
- Not *exactly* as cinematic a feel as the demo, but that is understandable. The story needs to play out over the course of the 20-plus hours it will take you to play through. Plasmids don’t come as fast, you are forced to deal with the balance issues, use money, pay the price for bad hacking, get at least two bots on your side, beat a Big Daddy, make a game-altering decision about the Little Sisters…
OK, given all of that maybe it is as cinematic. I was using the wrong term. It is paced differently, that’s all. Even so, I feel like I have experienced a full game already and I’ve not even left the medical pavilion yet!
- The game looks great on the 360. I can only imagine what a PC running a top video card can do with this.
- The aiming system is pretty good, for a 360 FPS. I’m not a Halo player, I prefer third-person shooters, but this works.
- Telekinesis is cool. The way the game teaches you to use it is really organic, not hokey like so many games and their training methods. See, one of the docs is clearly a big tennis player, and there’s a hallway with trophy cases...and a ball launcher. I think you see where this is going. :)
- The atmosphere is absolutely creepy. In some places it’s downright sinister and gruesome, with a high gore factor. Mostly it’s just depressingly, hauntingly decayed and beautiful, a monument to the dream of self-governance without interfere from massive egos and the rule of a state. You can feel the results of failure all around you. You can hear the cries of anguish and anger from what is left of the citizenry as the runaway science of bio-engineering abilities into their bodies eats away at what is left of them. And you are running around doing exactly the same thing. It’s definitely a Hitchcockian ticking bomb thing, loaded with suspense. In case you’re not following me, Hitchcock believed that showing you a scene with two men at a table having a coffee, then seeing a bomb blow them up is shock, but that’s not how you build suspense. If you really want to build suspense and keep people on the edge of panic, tell the audience that the bomb is there, and have the two men act as if nothing is happening. The whole time they chat and sip coffee, you’re thinking “OH MY GOD THERE IS A BOMB UNDER THE TABLE! RUN!”
Well, the whole time I am eagerly grabbing the ability to upgrade my DNA, I know that it will drive me insane and eventually kill me via a horrible, painful death. Unless...maybe I’m the only person in Rapture who can survive the process? Hope springs eternal.
- SPOILER! SPOILER! SPOILER!
- Regarding the big choice you have to make: You can rescue Little Sisters or choose to “harvest” them. Exactly how it sounds. Harvesting kills, rescuing turns them good...or so we think, so far. Rescuing results in the creator of the Little Sisters promising you a big reward, but it means less ADAM, the magic juice that allows you to do stuff and is “the thing that runs Rapture.” Harvesting means you piss her off, but get a lot more ADAM. I’ve chosen to play it by helping the Little Sisters, as I suspect it will be turned around on me later and I am curious to see what happens. I’ll play it the other way when I play through again on a harder setting.
So far? Best FPS I’ve played in a long, long time.
Posted by JimK at 07:50 PM on August 21, 2007
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Categories: Entertainment, Gaming, Xbox 360
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Comments:
#2 Posted by jo-jo 
on 08/22 at 10:55 AM -
john wants to get this (now that we’ve both beat the “hard” tour in GH2… btw, why don’t you have THAT yet??).
me, i’m still too picky about video games and what i spend my time playing (as you can see by my lameass gamer score). other than GH3 (pre-ordered), Rock Band and Beautiful Katamari (also pre-ordered), there’s not much coming out i’m all that psyched about. i’m also going to get the forthcoming Spyro game for the wii, but i wish it was for the 360.
i love the wii, don’t get me wrong, but it works best IMHO as a party console than a sit-around-for-hours-and-play-alone console. we hardly ever turn it on unless people are over. the graphics, frankly, are shit… and i need to up the aforementioned crappy gamer score ;)
#3 Posted by Sean Galbraith 
on 08/22 at 01:59 PM -
Man, that game sounds badass. I wish i knew someone around here that had a 360!
#4 Posted by Rann Aridorn on 08/22 at 03:25 PM -
I’ve chosen to play it by helping the Little Sisters, as I suspect it will be turned around on me later
I hope not, I always hate that “punish you for being a good guy” shtick.
#5 Posted by Noblebrown on 08/23 at 04:26 PM -
Man, that game sounds badass. I wish i knew someone around here that had a 360!
There’s a PC demo for it as well. If your computer has some hefty balls, give that one a look.
#6 Posted by jo-jo on 08/23 at 04:37 PM -
Man, that game sounds badass. I wish i knew someone around here that had a 360!
are you serious that you don’t know anyone with a 360?? aren’t you near dirk? or was that sarcasm i didn’t get or something ;) (i haven’t slept, pulled an all nighter, can’t brain...)
#7 Posted by Sean Galbraith on 08/24 at 12:07 PM -
You have no idea how difficult it is to get pencilled in on Dirk’s schedule.
(plus, I didn’t know he had a 360)
#9 Posted by Helo on 08/25 at 01:11 PM -
I’m thinking about getting an X-Box. Imagine my 30 year old ass buying video games. The world is a strange place, indeed…
#10 Posted by jo-jo on 08/25 at 02:57 PM -
*shrug* our 32 year old asses have 10 different console systems ranging from the 2600 to the wii (as our newest), so i don’t really see it as strange.
#11 Posted by JimK on 08/25 at 08:38 PM -
my 37-ish year old ass loves my console. In fact I can’t believe I held out for so long. Fuck PC gaming! Too damn expensive. ;)
#12 Posted by Drumwaster on 08/25 at 09:11 PM -
Con-sole?
{goes back to pounding rocks together}
#13 Posted by JimK on 08/26 at 12:09 AM -
Con-sole?
{goes back to pounding rocks together}
::stares at the old dude::
Con-sole. It’s a box, and all it does is play games? You know games?
And I’m NOT on your lawn, dammit. ;)
#14 Posted by EMalachi on 08/26 at 03:34 AM -
To all the people who are playing Bioshock:
What do you think of the game in relation to Atlas Shrugged?
When I was watching my friend play the demo I could not help be see the parallel between the idea of Rapture and Galt’s Gulch. So I am curious as to what happened to bring Rapture to the disaster you walk into in the begining.
#15 Posted by JimK on 08/26 at 03:44 PM -
Not only is it obvious, the influence, but the guy that guides you is names Atlas. :)
I think ultimately the destruction was brought about by Ryan’s ego coupled with the greed of a man named Fontaine, who was willing to use the freedoms of Rapture against Ryan in a criminal manner, causing Ryan to crack down like a dictator, causing a revolution, allowing more crime from Fontaine and more attempts at control from Ryan...the cycle and the pressure simply blew the city apart. Plus the fact that the genetic engineering went from useful to insane and dangerous. Objectivism gone horribly wrong.
I won’t spoil the end (I’m *almost* finished) but the story gets really interesting.
#16 Posted by Rann Aridorn on 08/26 at 03:58 PM -
Saw a thread on this the other day. Went something like this:
“Bah! The city is a Randian ideal! This game is Rand worship!”
“Hey, numnuts, the city that got fucked all to hell was based on Randian ideals. They’re saying Rand sucks.”
“Man, seems like an awful lot of work to do just to say ‘Rand bites’.”
“It’s not just saying ‘Rand bites’. It’s saying ‘Look, we’re sorry for not making System Shock 3, so here’s a really pretty game where you can turn into a human behive and fry shit with your mind. Oh, also, Rand bites.’”
#17 Posted by miguelito on 08/26 at 10:13 PM -
I wasted most of this weekend and finished the game a little while ago. There were some great plot twists… the story would’ve made a hell of a novel or movie in it’s own right.
Now I’ll have to give a shot at trying for the last couple of achievements I missed.. thought I got a 740 which I the best score I’ve gotten on a game when playing through without deliberately trying for achievements themselves. Though due to how cool the game is and wanted to experience every bit I did poke around everywhere looking for every detail, every tape, etc.
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The atmosphere you describe sounds very similar to System Shock 2. There were periods of inaction, there frequently wasn’t a beastie around the corner. And when there was, you shit your pants.