Is there something amazing in Bioshock that I failed to see??

Sure, it had a few good "what a twist!!" moments, but overall, I just dont understand why this game has had so much praise. I find it to be a mediocre FPS at best. The story overall was REALLY good, but I found the gameplay to be kind of boring. The enemies were more of anannoying nuisance than a challenge, and werent really satisfying to kill.The only incentive for playing it again, is to change your decision in saving or harvesting the little sisters...or maybe to get more achievements, like upgrading all of the weapons or something. Could somebody please explain to me why a LOT of people think this is the best game of the decade/ this generation?? I just dont see it.

Compared to extremely linear shooters like Gears of War or Halo, it was a lot more open-ended. You generally had a broad environment that you could walk around and fiddle with (hacking turrets and cameras, getting security bots to follow you, etc.). It also had the whole system of genetic enhancements that gave you an interesting gameplay element (not just shooting, you could also use plasmids to burn, freeze, electrocute, etc.).

I don't think it was revolutionary, but it was very polished and executed a lot of different things amazingly well.

Compared to extremely linear shooters like Gears of War or Halo, it was a lot more open-ended. You generally had a broad environment that you could walk around and fiddle with (hacking turrets and cameras, getting security bots to follow you, etc.). It also had the whole system of genetic enhancements that gave you an interesting gameplay element (not just shooting, you could also use plasmids to burn, freeze, electrocute, etc.).

I don't think it was revolutionary, but it was very polished and executed a lot of different things amazingly well.

masterpinky2000

Ok, ill agree with all of that. I guess I was just expecting something a bit different. Im not sure exactly what that was though...

what was amazing for me about bioshock is how it manipulated the player, and constantly signified the presence of goals in a way that contrasted greatly with the realistic feeling of the atmosphere and environment. it made the player feel like a slave, and my opinion was that it was playing on the passiveness of the player in the majority of games, and it turned that into a major plotline. it was very clever.

the game was also quite philosophical. it was inspired by the theory of objectivism. i don't actually know much about it, but it's kind of a first, that a game was built from the ground up according to a real life philosophical movement.

there were also allusions to kafka, and other writers. it might be that you just find those parts hard to appreciate because you don't know much about those writers.

i could go on... the voice acting, the environmental storytelling.. i think there were faults, but the game deserves the credit it gets.

I'm pretty sure it was the storytelling. You do all these things just to find out that you didn't do them because you wanted to, it's because you were programmed to do it when commanded to with a certain phrase. The environment told a story of the war that occured in Rapture and the recordings told another all of which seemed to connect in some way.

It was the most amazing game ever for about 2 days. After that it just got boring and repetitive, plus I got clausterphobic in those damn hallways. I like to be able to get out and breathe a la fallout 3.

BioShock was a big disappointment for me. It's an enjoyable game, but it fell short in every single aspect. It wasn't as open-ended as they promised, the AI was crap, moral decisions were meaningless, even the storytelling didn't win me over (it has a couple of good moments, but overall it just didn't pan out well). I never had the urge to replay it and that's a big deal for me considering BioShock is a story-driven single-player game.

I was always disappointed at how easy Big Daddies were to kill in that game (except first one)

Had the best atmosphere and feel to it of any game I've played probably since Deus Ex. I loved every minute of it, as a single player experience I'd say it is pretty hard to beat.

Sure, it had a few good "what a twist!!" moments, but overall, I just dont understand why this game has had so much praise. I find it to be a mediocre FPS at best. The story overall was REALLY good, but I found the gameplay to be kind of boring. The enemies were more of anannoying nuisance than a challenge, and werent really satisfying to kill.The only incentive for playing it again, is to change your decision in saving or harvesting the little sisters...or maybe to get more achievements, like upgrading all of the weapons or something. Could somebody please explain to me why a LOT of people think this is the best game of the decade/ this generation?? I just dont see it.

KcurtorMas

The story in Bioshock is pretty good but you never care about the characters, I spent the first half of the game thinking, "When is this idiot going to betray me, then I spent the next half thinking, "So when is Fontaine (SP, don't remember) going to betray me?" The enemies are terrible, except for the Big Daddies which are cool to watch, but very boring to fight. In Deus Ex I actually played through the game trying not to kill my enemies, using stealth or knocking them out, because some you fight are actually good and some used to be your friends and don't know what they are doing. Choosing to save or kill Little Sisters is almost a pointless element to the game, you get better rewards for saving and the woman pretty much tells you she can help them, it is in no way a difficult moral or gameplay decision. The twist near the end about them controlling you was pretty cool and original but that is it, it's nothing that makes me go, "Oh what a nice piece of dialoge I better give the game a 10 because those few lines just made up for all the problems that this game has."

The atmosphere was nice but that can't make up for poor gameplay, and I felt that the atmosphere wasn't as good the more the game went on. It was amazing when you started with the plane crashing, the statue of Andrew, first seeing the city, the shadow of the crazy lady with what you though was a baby then turned out to be a gun, but once the demo ended it just stopped being anywhere near as interesting.

Most of the people praising Bioshock so much have never played an FPS game with a decent story or good environment. Sure some people will be exceptions but for most people, if I only played a bunch of games like Gears of War and Halo I would find Bioshock to be amazing as well. It's like the people looking at trailers for Dragons Age Origin and, stupidly, comparing it to Oblivion instead of Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter, Icewind Dale,or Planescape and thinking that it looks terrible. They haven't played anything like it to compare it to to see how it stacks up.

[QUOTE="KcurtorMas"]

Sure, it had a few good "what a twist!!" moments, but overall, I just dont understand why this game has had so much praise. I find it to be a mediocre FPS at best. The story overall was REALLY good, but I found the gameplay to be kind of boring. The enemies were more of anannoying nuisance than a challenge, and werent really satisfying to kill.The only incentive for playing it again, is to change your decision in saving or harvesting the little sisters...or maybe to get more achievements, like upgrading all of the weapons or something. Could somebody please explain to me why a LOT of people think this is the best game of the decade/ this generation?? I just dont see it.

Legolas_Katarn

The story in Bioshock is pretty good but you never care about the characters, I spent the first half of the game thinking, "When is this idiot going to betray me, then I spent the next half thinking, "So when is Fontaine (SP, don't remember) going to betray me?" The enemies are terrible, except for the Big Daddies which are cool to watch, but very boring to fight. In Deus Ex I actually played through the game trying not to kill my enemies, using stealth or knocking them out, because some you fight are actually good and some used to be your friends and don't know what they are doing. Choosing to save or kill Little Sisters is almost a pointless element to the game, you get better rewards for saving and the woman pretty much tells you she can help them, it is in no way a difficult moral or gameplay decision. The twist near the end about them controlling you was pretty cool and original but that is it, it's nothing that makes me go, "Oh what a nice piece of dialoge I better give the game a 10 because those few lines just made up for all the problems that this game has."

The atmosphere was nice but that can't make up for poor gameplay, and I felt that the atmosphere wasn't as good the more the game went on. It was amazing when you started with the plane crashing, the statue of Andrew, first seeing the city, the shadow of the crazy lady with what you though was a baby then turned out to be a gun, but once the demo ended it just stopped being anywhere near as interesting.

Most of the people praising Bioshock so much have never played an FPS game with a decent story or good environment. Sure some people will be exceptions but for most people, if I only played a bunch of games like Gears of War and Halo I would find Bioshock to be amazing as well. It's like the people looking at trailers for Dragons Age Origin and, stupidly, comparing it to Oblivion instead of Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter, Icewind Dale,or Planescape and thinking that it looks terrible. They haven't played anything like it to compare it to to see how it stacks up.

**SPOILER**

the game needed to be about fetch quests, because you were a robot, following commands.

but otherwise, i agree that the RPG elements were somewhat flawed, and a little weak/uneccessary. the little sister moral choices and the ending were not my favourtie parts, but the rest of the game was very good. it doesn't need to be compared and rated directly to other FPS games. it's a philosophical, immersive story.

I bought this game well over a year ago, played it for awhile then forgot about it cause I just couldnt get into it. Then I picked it up again recently, started playing itand now I love it. I dont know what changed but I see now why it keeps getting all the praise it does.

Fallout 3 changed my view in the game. BioShock has fantastic cinamatics and gameplay but you were right there isnt enough weopon choice. isnt that what makes an RPG good. fallout 3 has a big variety of wepeons and no matter how much you play it it doesnt get old but bioshock is also good. its a unique game. pretty good though. id say better off with fallout 3.

Yes, but I'm not going to bother trying to sell you on the game. If you don't like it, that's your incorrect opinion.

you were right there isnt enough weopon choice. isnt that what makes an RPG good.

Oh, yeah, I forgot about the end of the game.

What a slap in the face.

Talk about giving the middle finger to the player and invalidating everything that came up to that point.

[spoiler] Instead of having a moment that actually touches on the story of the game, you're thrust into a copy of a final boss battle from every FPS since the Doom era, which is made worse by the game's shoddy combat. Then after you beat him there's a twenty second (if that) FMV that varies depending on whether you played the game good or bad. That's it - that's where the touted 'choice' comes into play and it's completely hollow and meaningless. [/spoiler]

I don't know how they could have fixed it, but man, what a letdown.

Fallout 3 changed my view in the game. BioShock has fantastic cinamatics and gameplay but you were right there isnt enough weopon choice. isnt that what makes an RPG good. fallout 3 has a big variety of wepeons and no matter how much you play it it doesnt get old but bioshock is also good. its a unique game. pretty good though. id say better off with fallout 3.

redeskimo

if you didn't like it the first time- try playing again, but get different plasmids.

The second time I played through, I saved the lil' gals, and had alot more fun with the reward plasmids