Review: Bioshock (XBOX 360)
Arguably one of the most anticipated titles of the year finally hits the Xbox 360 and PC this week: Bioshock. Whereas other first person shooters have been focusing on multiplayer fragfests, capture the flag and other competitive testosterone-fueled madness, Bioshock perfects the single player formula making the most significant impact on gaming since Half Life 2. I had the privilege of playing the game early, spending my entire weekend probing the inner depths of the underwater city of Rapture. It's a fantastic, mysterious, spooky place - but it's not without its flaws (both metaphorically and physically). We've gushed about Bioshock for months now here at The Weekly Geek, and personally I haven't looked forward to a game this much since the original Metroid Prime on the Gamecube. Simply put Bioshock is one of the few hyper-anticipated games that actually lives up to the hype. I'll try to keep the spoilers low in my gushing review.
Shininess: Bioshock sets the bar for all first person shooters to come. That's not to say that there aren't any clipping errors, animation glitches, or general graphical weirdness, but it's as close to perfection as this generation has achieved so far. The landmark water effects are stunning and brilliantly executed, little details like a leak in a wall with water flowing across the tile onto the floor, or a flooded tunnel make the world feel damp, immersive and claustrophobic. Much care was taken into making the city of Rapture stand out as its own character in the story. Objects are perfectly placed and natural so that you don't even realize they are there. Does that make sense? It's like everything just sort of fits. An office might have books and papers littered on a desk, so detailed you can read them. A table might have a bottle of wine and a party hat sitting on it. Light from the windows out into the open sea reflects on the floor and shimmers. If you don't stop and appreciate it all, you'd never even think twice that you were in an imaginary world.
The atmosphere is eerie and brilliant, accentuated by the ecology of the world itself. Splicers walk around singing to themselves, or ranting, or getting into fights with the shambling Big Daddies. The Big Daddies are in turn protective of the Little Sisters, who cheer the Big Daddies on when they battle Splicers, or you. Hearing the low rumbling of a Big Daddy in the next room is one of the creepiest sounds in a video game ever, honestly.
The music fits perfectly. There are so many moments in this game that are just holy crap scary movie moments, stunningly executed. You'll be turning the corner down a hallway and hear a splicer talking to herself, rambling nonsense. Then all you see is her shadow, stabbing at something in the low light. The music swells and then she disappears from sight. A staticky radio all of a sudden switches on and starts playing a creaky old version of "Beyond the Sea". The feeling is positively fantastic. Everything just plain comes together.
As far as gripes go, there are a couple small issues that crop up that bump you out of the immersive world of Rapture. Sometimes corpses will jiggle uncontrollably if they land in a weird position. Clothing doesn't move naturally. Facial expressions and lip sync are non-existent. It seems like the developers decided to spend less time on the actual animation of the faces of their characters and hide this fact by keeping them either in shadow, or with their backs turned to you. This is fine, though sometimes it feels a bit like a cop out. There is a deadness to the characters, while the rest of the world is so full of life. But this is just a minor gripe. It's a seriously detailed, pretty game. Even the menus are painstakingly well put-together in a classy 1950's art deco cereal ad style. Campy, creepy and fantastic.
Funness: I am not a fan of first person shooters by a large margin. I desire storyline and great gameplay over competitive testosterone fests. I left high school, I don't want to go back. This is why I dislike games like Halo, which exist purely in a multiplayer "my cock is bigger than yours" fashion. I loved Half Life and Half Life 2, which brought you into an interesting world and told a story, while still having the adrenaline-fueled run and gun game play. Bioshock takes this a step further by combining shooting, stealth, strategy, trap-setting, puzzling and picture taking to the mix. There feels like there is a ridiculous amount of things to do in the game, because there is. There are over 70 Plasmids which augment your abilities and customize your character. Literally you can find a play style that fits you best and play through thusly. I played for the first time on Easy and it was a little bit too easy, in my opinion. I didn't have the need to really play with and explore what kind of traps I could set and how to best utilize some of the more obscure plasmids, like the target dummy. But amp the game up to Hard and it becomes an entirely different creature. Insanely difficult and satisfying.
The play controls are perfect for a console. I haven't ever played a shooter that felt so natural. It's your basic mana-based spell system but it's perfectly executed. Plasmids on the left trigger and weapon on your right. Press the requisite bumper to select a different one and you're set. It's uncomplicated and smooth. This will be the new standard FPS control scheme, mark my words. Mark them!
The exploration aspect is a bit downplayed. It's a very linear game with small interspersed non-linear moments. Playing through I craved the backtracking of a good Metroid title, which Bioshock only slightly touches on. Being in such a detailed city I really wanted an excuse to look around and get familiar with places, but I just wasn't satisfied in that. I enjoyed the leisurely pace at which I can choose to take on Big Daddies, and enemies don't automatically regenerate health points, so you can whittle away at them as much as you want. The boss battles were another minor disappointment, I would have really liked to have some huge epic battles with something other than normal (albeit Plasmid-augmented) humans. I wanted to fight a giant squid that comes crashing through a tunnel, or some crazy plant-beast a-la Metroid or Resident Evil or God of War. The boss battles tend to be basic shooter fare, with the addition of your customized abilities. And that's ok, because Bioshock is a shooter. It doesn't claim to be anything but a shooter, and it does "shooter" better than any around today.
Worthiness: You've heard us gushing about the game for a while now so you know our opinion on it. It's fantastic. Is it the game of the decade? Probably not, depending on your criteria. Is it a system seller? I'd say so. I think Bioshock set out to redefine the shooter genre, to place an emphasis back on great storytelling, emotion and player control. You have moral choices in the game, and some of them have really tragic consequences. The story is deep and intriguing for a video game, but it would most likely be a bit clichéd in any other medium. It's fairly short, but what you do get to play is honed and perfected as much as any game can reasonably get. The achievements will keep you coming back, as well as the sheer customization of it all. There are so many ways to fight Splicers and Big Daddies in the game, you'll be thinking for days after a battle of other ways you could have defeated them. A game that sticks in your head even after you play it is a great thing indeed. Buy it, don't rent it.
Score: 5/5 Buy it!
What say you?!