5 Reasons BioShock Rocks

BioShock will dazzle, hook and impress gamers when it goes on sale next week. How do we know? Because we’ve been playing it. A lot.

While we’ll be reviewing the game after the weekend, we’ve put together a short and sweet list of five reasons why BioShock rocks. See below.

5) Plasmids are the Sh!t
Along your adventure, you’ll discover and have to use biogenetically-engineered (but magic-esque) powers called plasmids. With these, you’re able to shoot fire from your hands, which melts ice and cooks baddies, as well as do a number of other entertaining things. For example, one plasmid enables you to freeze foes with a blast of ice, leaving you free to shatter them with your wrench. Not only are plasmids an excellent option for laying waste to the nuthouses running throughout Rapture, they’re essential puzzle-solving tools that you have to exploit to progress into the game. Plasmids bring a level of variety to BioShock’s first-person shooting gameplay that’s very much appreciated.

4) Big Daddies are Your Father
You’ve no doubt seen the screenshots, but you won’t understand how cool the character design behind these metal diving suit-encased bad boys are until you see them in motion – in 1080p (or on any TV, really). Throughout the game, you’ll encounter Big Daddies along with their shepherd, a Little Sister. The game requires you to free the Little Sisters of a certain something we won’t go into detail about, but you can’t do that without downing their protective guardian: the Big Daddy. These fights rarely disappoint and are always challenging, thanks to smart AI and tight level design that go together better than most couples today.

3) The Weapons are Satisfying
Although BioShock is very much about exploration and discovery, it’s rooted in the first-person shooter genre. So, while guns aren’t the only tool at your disposal for killing the crazies inhabiting the city of Rapture, they’re incredibly satisfying to use. Firing a magnum triggers a loud, powerful thump, followed by splashes of blood erupting from your enemy. The shotgun provides the same effect – only it’s three times as powerful and three times as fun, too. There are a variety of other weapons, as well, and just about each one is wholly entertaining to use, but we won’t spoil what other weapons you get your hands on, so you’ll just have to take our word for it.

2) The Level Design Delivers
BioShock may take place under water, but it’s absolutely overflowing with richly detailed and varied areas to explore, each different from the last. The setting itself is magnificent – a metropolis located on the bottom of the deep blue sea, and so are the different sections within the city. For example, you’ll explore everything from a disturbing and twisted plastic surgery center, which includes butchered patients nailed to walls crucifixion-style, to a huge, elegant garden, populated with trees that produce oxygen for the submerged city. It’s hard to put the controller down, as you want to keep playing just to see where you’ll end up next.

1) It’s Oozing Atmosphere
Graphics sure as hell aren’t the only thing that matters when it comes to game design, but it definitely makes a game even more awesome when it’s jaw-droppingly gorgeous. Oh, and when a game sounds so amazing that you play it at a deafening volume because you love it that much, that’s a big plus too. BioShock is one of those games that brilliantly combines both visuals and audio, creating a package that makes it not only one of the most atmospheric games on Xbox 360 but one of the most atmospheric games we’ve ever played. Each room you step foot in immerses more than the one before it, and each is flooded in careful detail. Failing lights flicker back and forth between on and off, things are on fire, desks are turned over, destruction is everywhere and crazed citizens wonder about, screaming profane and delirious things. And just when you forget that this twisted metropolis is at the bottom of the sea, you walk through a glass tunnel and see the underwater skyscrapers surrounding you.