What do you think of the BioShock series?

[Your Weird Fetish]

I think the original concept of waking up locked in some bioweapons lab in a hidden bunker that had developed its own twisted ecosystem was a lot cooler than what ended up being released years later.

 

[Picnic_Boy]

I enjoyed the first two. Skipped the third because its politics had a very heavy-handed Land of the Dead vibe.

 

[_blank_]

Bioshock holds a very special place in my heart. After being a Nintendo fantard up until the early 00s, the only FPS games I've ever played were either Nintendo licensed (Goldeneye, Perfect Dark), or older PC games like Wolf3d or Doom. After I divorced myself from Nintendo after their godawful E3 2008, I went and bought a 360, along with a copy of Bioshock. Fucking loved it.

Bought the Collector's edition of Bioshock 2 and tbh, while the story in and of itself isn't as good as the original, the lore it expanded upon was gratly appreciated. Only downside was that it did feel kind weird to be playing a Big Daddy (albeit a prototype version) and still being able to use plasmids and guns. the Minerva's Den DLC was pretty damn great though.

Also enjoyed the Rapture novel which came out a few years ago. Not essential reading material, but its a fun look at the rise and catastrophic collapse of everyone's favorite glass city.

As for Bioshock Infinite... I have mixed feelings. While I love the style and the graphics and the play mechanics, while not as tight as other games, did feel a bit better than the previous two, I do feel that, comparing the final version against the reveal and early gameplay videos released, the main idea of the game was continuously whittled down due to lack of time and/or lack of resources. The ending was a let down, yes, because any time you have to rely on time travel to resolve a story, in almost always sucks. The Elizabeth DLCs were okay, but also felt unnecessary and were pretty much just fanservice for people who missed Rapture.

 

[Ruin]

The original was great but the devs took the wrong message away from it's success and assumed that what people wanted was more heavy handed political preaching instead of interesting environments and more things to kill.

 

[Lipitor]

The first two are excellent for all the previously stated reasons.

Here is my main complaint about bioshock infinite. The whole weapons system was poorly implemented. First of all you have to aim down sights to hit anything, which means you're not gonna be doing one-two punches with your gun and then hit em with magic. I know aim down sights is popular, mainly cuz of COD, but it's out of place in a bioshock game. Second of all they made you have to level up your guns with paid upgrades. Here is why that's stupid. You can only carry two weapons at a time. You pretty much get what the level gives you.. really like a gun? too bad this level has no ammo for that gun and so you'll need to drop it for a weapon that does have ammo. What is the point of leveling up my favorite weapon if the level is gonna dictate what I have to use anyway? Furthermore halfway through the game you get NEW weapons, which are clones of the old weapons, but with a different color... so even if you had upgraded a gun you really liked, it wouldn't matter now, cuz this is a new gun.
What makes it even more infuriating is how BS 1/2 got weapons so right and here we have a spiritual successor that doesn't pay homage to that detail.

 

[Picnic_Boy]

The original was great but the devs took the wrong message away from itssuccess and assumed that what people wanted was more heavy handed political preaching instead of interesting environments and more things to kill.

Bioshock 2, I think, was vague enough about its politics to be enjoyable to most people. The environments might have seemed dull because they so closely resembled the first game, but the gameplay and story itself were fine. Infinite, however, is very clearly a reaction to the Tea Party era, and has aged poorly because of it.

 

[enderpotato00]

The original was great but the devs took the wrong message away from it's success and assumed that what people wanted was more heavy handed political preaching instead of interesting environments and more things to kill.

Not really. I think it blends story and gameplay very well. The cutscenes aren't horribly long, you can find more of the story via the diaries. But still gun-play is the biggest focus

 

[Black Waltz]

I really liked infinite when I first played it, but then I saw the early gameplay trailers, and I felt ripped off.

Also the final part of the game where you have to defend the airship is the worst fucking thing I've ever had to do in a game

 

[enderpotato00]

I really liked infinite when I first played it, but then I saw the early game play trailers, and I felt ripped off.

Also the final part of the game where you have to defend the airship is the worst fucking thing I've ever had to do in a game

I thought it was even worse than protecting the little sisters in the first game.

 

[Bassomatic]

I don't game so feel free to throw my two cents in the trash.

One was great and fell apart at the end.
Two drug out
Three I didn't bother to finish because so watered down

I honestly didn't know of DLC etc. What I liked about one it wasn't "shaming" in regards to looser regs. What I thought was a high point early in the game that surgeon dude goes off on symmetry as if it's evil. Also El Bandito is my main nigga. He made me laugh. None of the series got as dark.

2 felt over forced in a lot.

3 well I'm with everyone it sucked. I didn't finish it.

 

[Sexual Chocolate]

BioShock 1 was great. Fun gameplay and the art, music, writing and voice acting raised the bar for what vidya games could be as cultural artifacts rather than just disposable entertainment (BioShock - specifically, Rapture, has stayed with me more than most movies I've seen).

The character of Andrew Ryan had real pathos and his voice acting (by the same guy who played Quark in DS9) was perfect.

BioShock 2 is the sequel nobody really wanted (the story didn't need a follow up), but was a lot of fun in spite of that. It's a bit cheap (mostly reused assets, making it feel like a long expansion pack) and the characters are less memorable, but it's still enjoyable and smarter than most FPS games despite all that.

I liked Infinite. The story didn't make a lot of sense, the gameplay was a bit meh in a lot of places, and it clearly suffers from the scaled down ambition of the final product compared with its original concept.

But the characters and world building are excellent. Particularly the voice acting and musical choices. Coming across the barbershop quartet singing a goosebumps-inducing version of "God Only Knows" was a amazing. Elizabeth is a great character, played perfectly, and never feels like an escort mission NPC.

But most of all, Infinite made me feel feels, and that's rare in a game. It's genuinely moving, and quite daring in the type of emotions it portrays.

I don't know if Ken Levine is a father and I'm too lazy to Googleize it, but it's curious how his BioShock masterpieces are all about fatherhood (and both include the death of the father at the hands of his child).

Andrew Ryan tells you, playing his son Jack, that you're his greatest disappointment... before making you kill him.

Infinite is about paternal guilt, and fighting to expiate the shame of having been a bad father. Booker is the ultimate deadbeat Dad, but he's trying to set things right, and ultimately sacrifices himself to do so.

Then there's the Big Daddy / Little Sister thing in Rapture. It would be cheap to describe this in Freudian terms, but the awesome - sometimes crushing - responsibility of parenthood seems to loom large in Levine's mind.

"God Only Knows" is a song that could've been written for Booker, but also for any father. Because "I may not always love you" - sometimes it's hard to feel love for your children when they've starved you of sleep because they won't stop crying all night or have a meltdown in the middle of a supermarket or steal your phone and drop it in the toilet.

But God only knows what you'd be without them. Because they charge your life, and you never stop worrying about them from the moment they're born.

 

[Violence Jack]

I liked both of the first two, but upon replay they really show their linear nature. One hides it better and even tries to make a statement about linearity (would you kindly etc.) but i felt like it fell flat on it's face. I think Yahtzee or someone stated that if the game wanted to follow through on that theme it should've opened up as a result allowing you to complete objectives in whatever order you chose. But instead it throws in a boring escort section and an underwhelming boss fight at you. I guess to illustrate the nature of games being linear and you being dumb for expecting a choice because you're a rube. Also everything looks like it's smothered in vaseline.

Two was a little better in the gameplay department, but as mentioned it feels incredibly short and linear upon replay. My second run was about 4 hours with vaguely knowing where to go. Also the shoehorned-in moral choices rear their ugly head yet again to a resounding meh. The parental aspect of Bioshock 2 felt a little less forced, but damn if that isn't the crux of these games. Eleanor Lamb was an alright concept and I thought fleshed out some aspects of the world more. Although you can tell that the story must have undergone a lot of revisions (the arg that's barely mentioned in game comes to mind, and Tenenbaum leaving during the first act). Which is a shame cause it feels like it would've been a more interesting game as a result. I don't think it's a stretch to say that Minerva's Den was a much better self-contained story, and one i wish they went with instead of Delta and Eleanor's parental... journey. Also Eleanor's eyes appearing in Delta's head creeped me out more times than I care to admit.

Infinite? Eh, Elizabeth had some nice baps i guess. Wish they kept the bob cut/hour glass figure instead of making her literally Belle from Beauty and the Beast. Her being the ultimate badass is dumb and feels even worse than Eleanor being the chosen one. The story beats are tonally dissonant at times and the gameplay leaves much to be desired (why only two weapons?). Also halo shield in this game that's trying to be intellectual by attempting to include quantum physics within the confines of a computer game. It's even more clear that infinite had multiple (maybe even infinite?!) variations before arriving at the product we got. I wish there could be a curation of all the builds they went through. Also holy shit, fuck burial at sea what a waste of a good pop at the end of infinite by setting them in rapture.

Despite all my problems with these games they're all pretty solid with the exception of Infinite, which feels like a mess they had to salvage.

 

[mr.moon1488]

Not bad, but very overrated. I think it would be a lot better if they made the RPG elements deeper, and made it into an open world. It's very open for a linear game, but it is still a linear game.

 

[Slap47]

The original was great but the devs took the wrong message away from it's success and assumed that what people wanted was more heavy handed political preaching instead of interesting environments and more things to kill.

The politics was pretty central to that worldbuilding though. I think the issue is that they made it less believable and gave the idea being criticized less of a fair shake - or at least a few less free bones. Of course, racism = bad is hardly all that thought provoking or interesting.

Regardless, the gameplay was only Ok. The level design was dogshit despite the interestng world and the fighting was stupidly easy.

 

[BrunoMattei]

The original is probably a masterpiece. I don't care about story in games but Bioshock 1 is an exception. Plus it hits a perfect middle ground between old school and new school FPS. The levels are big and varied but you have optional hints and a pointer to show you where the objective is. The gunplay and use of Plasmids is great too. My only critique is that it's too easy and has to be played on hard, but the downside to that is that enemies just become bullet sponges by the end game and you can whale on them with the grenade launcher all day and hope they go down.

2nd one was very mediocre but I do like the change to hacking. That was the one improvement. I hated it so never completed it.

I never beat the 3rd one because I just got bored of it.

 

[JM 590]

I didn't get very far into Bioshock Infinite either, it was just flat-out boring. I quit fairly early on.

The first game had a neat story but was far too easy and never really felt like a satisfying game to play, and the second was more fun but just felt like a generic FPS. It should have been an expansion pack to the first game instead.

 

[Slowboat to China]

Add me to the list of people who like 1 and 2 and don't care for Infinite. I didn't get escort mission fatigue from 2--I liked the challenge of mining the area and setting everything up just so, and then standing back and blowing away any mofos who tried to touch my Little Sister. And I liked getting to see more of Rapture, especially the bugfuck insanity that was the Ryan's Amusements level. Sure, it felt like an extra-long DLC, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Infinite, on the other hand, was starting too many hares at once. Combine that with more restrictive gameplay and the weird "did you know racism is bad?" feel of the whole thing, and I just wasn't having fun. Finishing it felt like a chore.

As for the ending ... Well, I'm reminded of something Yahtzee once said about the God of War franchise. Namely, that it feels like the most moral thing to do is to stop playing, because you're just enabling Kratos in his senseless murder spree. The message I got from the ending was that you were always corrupt, you were always doomed, and the most noble thing you can do is kill yourself to stop your evil spreading. Which kinda felt like a slap in the face after all the effort I'd put into finishing the damn game.

 

[c-no]

Had fun with the first one but three was a let down. I was somewhat hyped for Infinite when I saw the initial gameplay trailers and all but once I got to see the finished and playing it years later, it was a let down.

Still have more fun playing System Shock 2 though. That for me is a more memorable experience than being underwater or up in the sky.

 

[BrunoMattei]

I thought System Shock 2 was okay. I didn't like the infinitely respawning enemies and how unforgiving it was when it came to leveling up your stats. If you lock yourself in with the wrong stats at the wrong time you're pretty much fucked. Bioshock 1 handled that element much better.

 

[Vault Boy]

I love them all, although I have to give the edge to 2. Whereas the first game has somewhat mediocre combat and Infinite feels a bit "stripped down" in terms of mechanics, I think 2 strikes a good balance with engaging combat and different mechanics for more diverse playstyles. Couple that with the usual engrossing atmosphere and the entirety of Minerva's Den, and I think 2 is the most well-rounded of the series.

Again though, big fan of the series, and I'm interested in seeing where it goes if it ever gets another installment.