BioShock Review
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The story is pretty linear. While you're pretty much free to go anywhere you want within constrained areas, you can't actually progress the game much other than in following the set of events Irrational assigned to the player. This means that despite promises to the contrary, every play-through will be basically the same except in the details. The details themselves aren't half bad, and they do offer some richness of gameplay. Apart from the question of how you approach the Little Sisters, there is a lot to enjoy in experimenting with different combinations of weapons, plasmids and tonics. The (living, breathing world) of Rapture applies to a lot of smaller details, as NPCs wander around living their lives for most of the time. This doesn't apply to key NPCs, meaning the hinges of the storyline are always at exactly the same spot. For the most part, you won't notice much about Rapture's living world unless you go out and search for it.
The Game's Soul
The game's graphics are nothing short of grand. The lighting, textures and models are all superbly crafted. More importantly, the game is very well optimized, breaking a lot of current weak standards by being easily playable on a computer a few years old, albeit with a lot of graphical options turned down.
More importantly, those great graphics are used to support a great atmosphere. Rapture is a visually stunning place, made with great attention to detail and a lot of spirit, with the caveat that it's suspiciously close to Fallout at times. Rapture is a mix of a Victorian world with a retro-50's world; throw in some steampunk elements and you're sure to be visually wowed frequently as you make your way through the game. This tough combination of settings is done extremely well here, with an obviously consistent vision stopping it from feeling too dispersed.
The atmosphere is supported by the amazing voice acting. And you will hear people talk a lot, not just through the radio or old audio recordings, but also in the eerie sound of a splicer talking to himself about various insane topics or a Little Sister innocently frolicking about talking about angels. The music fits in well, complimenting the background noise of bulkheads grinding or the jarring beat of a Big Daddy's heavy feet thumping in the distance.
