Would you kindly?

Hopefully if you've played this game you won't need telling what it is... of course it is Bioshock. Released in 2007 on 360 and PC, but joyfully appeared on PS3 the following year (joyfully because how would I have played it otherwise?) Just to jog your memory: you play as Jack (apparently) although I don't remember ever being informed that your name is Jack. After being in a plane crash, you swim to the surface and discover Rapture. Rapture deserves a new paragraph because it is amazing.

 

Make sure you pack your Speedos



Andrew Ryan... bit of a sexist?

  Rapture is an underwater world and a gamers dream come true. Created by Andrew Ryan, this underwater city has 'NO GODS OR KINGS. ONLY MAN' which is interesting because the inhabitants of Rapture are more than human, they have been genetically altered through the use of plasmids. Andrew Ryan created this world on the basis that the inhabitants could shape their own future and 'with the sweat of your own brow' you can live the way you want and shape your own future. The idea of leaving the laws and morals of the real world and creating your very own is a very seductive, but dangerous one. Bioshock shows this perfectly with a city in ruin, leaking all over the place and falling in on itself. The only inhabitants left are all absolutely crazy and deformed from abusing the power of plasmids. They dedicate their lives to their search for the drug they need, which is ADAM. Only Little Sisters have this so obviously that's who the splicers are looking for- trouble is there's a Big Daddy in the way most of the time. That's where you step in: you have to fight off the wierdo masked splicers and the drill-armed, grate-faced, size-58-shoed Big Daddies. All this for a chance to have your morals tested by a creepy little girl.



Why wouldn't you want to
save this cute little face?



Basically the story revolves around the Little Sisters and the way you interact with them. You have to bust up a Big Daddy if you want to get to them, but once you do you can choose to harvest them for their ADAM or save them by removing the slug inside them. There are greater rewards for harvesting them, but you get a warm fuzzy feeling if you save them. Anyone that knows my gaming habits will know that I love a good choice and that I obviously saved them (being the devout and pious being that I am) but the choice does hang there throughout the game and the extra rewards for harvesting them are just enough to make a budding sociopath see reason in slaughtering a child for more drugs. Seriously though, I love me some moral dilemmas and this game delivers there. The game has different endings depending on whether you're more Gary Glitter or Ghandi and I can say with no shame (well, minimal shame) that I shed a single tear when I got my ending.

With one of the best settings I've encountered in a videogame, I would say that Bioshock sits up there with my favourites. The mix of first-class gameplay, a stylish and consitent in-depth setting and a brilliant, shocking and genuinely affecting storyline makes this a perfect choice if you want to play something complete and contained. There is a downside to all this glorious underwater heaven- apparently the sequel is turd... I'll have to test the waters (see what I did there?) Now would you kindly comment and click the "Follow" button?

DannyDarko