Welcome to Rapture! Enjoy your stay!

Game: Bioshock
Available Platforms: PS3 (reviewed), Xbox 360, Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X

 “Rapture.
A city where the artist would not fear the censor,
where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality,
where the great would not be constrained by the small.
And with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city, as well."

―Andrew Ryan.

It’s not very often that I come across a game which completely blows me away like this. Bioshock is a first-person science fiction horror set in the 1960s with a heavy influence on the steampunk sub-genre. After the plane you were on crashes into the Atlantic Ocean, you end up finding your way to an underwater city, known as Rapture. Founded by Andrew Ryan, the city is designed to be a place without religion, leadership (i.e. government), and scientists’ experiments are not held back by moral or ethical issues.
The game is a fight for survival as you fight your way through the city. Resource management is one of the key mechanics in the game. Throughout Rapture you collect a range of weapons, from a basic pistol to a chemical thrower. However, if you are not careful, you may end up creeping around the leaking, gloomy, underwater corridors with just your wrench.
The other major mechanic is the use of plasmids and biological tonics. Plasmids are genetic mutations you inject into yourself to turn your body into a DIY weapon. The weapons range from the predicable electricity and fire plasmids to the ability to shoot swarms of killer bees at enemies. The tonics upgrade other attributes such as strength, the ability to hack vending machines and turrets, turn you invisible, or you can have “cold touch” which can freeze anyone who hits you with a melee attack. You can only have a certain number of upgrades equipped at any one time so you can also completely customise your upgrades to your playing style.
Apart from the fact that Rapture has been ripped apart by its crazy inhabitants, the city looks beautiful. Every detail has been thought through. It is one of the few games I have played that actually runs natively in full 1080p HD (most games run in 720p, despite what the box says). The graphics, lighting, sound effects all add up to this perfectly crafted (and very believable) world. As you work your way through the city you can image how it could have looked before it turned into this hellish place. The overall effect is the perfect atmosphere that any horror game could ever dream of having. The icing on the cake is the use of 1930s music played over a crackly gramophone PA system. Listen to “La Mer” by Django Reinhardt then play the Bioshock demo (available on Microsoft Windows via Steam). The use of the song as you enter the lighthouse sets the game up brilliantly.
There is a mixture of enemies in the game, but the majority are different types of “splicers”. These are humans driven crazy by their obsession with ADAM (the substance used to create the plasmids). They can jump out of nowhere and some like to crawl along the ceiling and drop down on their victims. However, even these enraged human-like creatures fear the bouncers or “Big Daddies”. Big Daddies are creatures dressed in old fashioned dive gear and the early warning to know they are close is the ground shaking from the steps of their heavy lead-lined boots. These enemies come complete with a giant drill for their right hand and an oversized machine gun in their left. Big Daddies protect “Little Sisters” who are possessed young girls who use a large syringe to extract ADAM from the bodies of dead splicers.
This game IS scary, but there are not too many genuinely “jumpy” sections. The scariness is created by the atmosphere and the music. I downloaded the demo after hearing people rave about it and I had to go and buy the game as soon as it finished. I highly recommend to everyone (over the age of 18 of course – and I completely agree this age rating is appropriate) to play through this game, even if you are a bit of a wimp (like me). The level of storytelling is extremely high and the genius of the plot twist is what makes this game one of the best I have ever played. Welcome to Rapture. Enjoy your stay...