72 replies to this topic

[Lord Thag]

Just played about four hours of it. I must say, this is one damned amazing game! From the creepy ambience of the dying underwater city, to the fantastically fun and inventive powers (incinerate is just so much candy), to the intelligent enemies to the lumbering and awesomely fun to fight Big Daddies (which are just about the most intimidating enemy I've fought to date), this game is an A+ title all the way.

It reminds me of a cross between System Shock 2, Doom 3 (the scary/creepy stuff and the audio diaries), with the excellent enemy AI from Halo 2 thrown in with a healthy dose of originality. This is trully a first person adventure game, and it also reminds me a bit of metroid prime, only with less backtracking, and way more blood, guts, and awesome ways to kill things. The plot is excellent as well, and the visual style is really great. The levels feel real, like you're actually running around in the decaying underwater metropolis.

Hell, I can't really think of anything I don't like about it. If you're on the fence about this one, don't be. This is the next great franchise.

Edited by Lord Thag, Wed Aug 22, 2007 1:47 AM.

[moycon]

Mine shipped yesterday, I hope it comes today or the next.

I've considered running out, buying a copy and then returning the unopened one when I get it (Wouldn't be the first time)

Alas Wal Mart didnt have any yesterday when I checked.

[MCHufnagel]

TO ALL!

Circuit City has this game for $10 off of both versions (PC and X360). If CC is sold out, go to Best buy and price match. I was at Best Buy last night and did the price match. Best Buy had tons of both versions there. It looks like I'll start to play this asap!

[Scumdogg]

I've been on a long break from purchasing games, and was pretty much set to wait until GTA IV came out, and have that be my next new game. Now what with the delay, i've been thinking about getting something else. I haven't gotten a game magazine in a while or really paid attention to release news, but all of a sudden i keep hearing about this Bioshock....sounds like i might need to go pick it up.

[Red 5]

Scumdogg, on Wed Aug 22, 2007 2:52 PM, said:

I've been on a long break from purchasing games, and was pretty much set to wait until GTA IV came out, and have that be my next new game. Now what with the delay, i've been thinking about getting something else. I haven't gotten a game magazine in a while or really paid attention to release news, but all of a sudden i keep hearing about this Bioshock....sounds like i might need to go pick it up.

You speak true sai.
(sorry... re-reading Dark Tower series...)

If I may 'comic-book-guy it up' .... Best .... game .... ever ! ! !

Maybe not the best game ever, but easily in the top three for Xbox 360 games and definitely a must have.
I'm three hours in and can't freakin' wait to get home and play more.
It's so deep. Adding powers add a fun strategic element to the game since you can only use two at any given time (at the
beginning of the game).

I am addicted to hacking vending machines, safes and security devices.

Looting the dead bodies is just lots and lots of fun.

Deciding to kill or save a little sister was pretty intense (you'll see).

Great environment. Great weapons and ways to mix stuff up to kill baddies. Using my fireball power to hit an oil spill to wipe out three baddies at once was a great moment for sure.

Using telekenetics to catch grenades and toss them back at people = pure fun.

The detail in every room you go into is mind boggling.
Even the fact that I "played piano" on the title screen for about three or four minutes is a tribute to the games
great way to pay attention to all the little things.

Now go !
We are done here !
Go get this game and write me a thank you letter !

GO !

[Albert]

I have not picked this up yet, but there are apparently big problems with the PC release for many people (and even some people having problems with the 360 version). Tons of people having problems getting the game to run on the PC, as well as many issues with the game crashing frequently. And on top of that it's using Sony's evil SecuRom copy protection that limits you to installing the game TWICE without jumping through hoops. I would NEVER buy the PC version after learning that, that sort of crap really pisses me off and the only people it will hinder are people who legitimately purchase the game. Big strike in my eyes for 2K Boston (formally Irrational Games, formed by a bunch of ex-Looking Glass people, where I worked for aw hile..)

..Al

[moycon]

Albert, on Wed Aug 22, 2007 8:38 PM, said:

I have not picked this up yet, but there are apparently big problems with the PC release for many people (and even some people having problems with the 360 version). Tons of people having problems getting the game to run on the PC, as well as many issues with the game crashing frequently. And on top of that it's using Sony's evil SecuRom copy protection that limits you to installing the game TWICE without jumping through hoops. I would NEVER buy the PC version after learning that, that sort of crap really pisses me off and the only people it will hinder are people who legitimately purchase the game. Big strike in my eyes for 2K Boston (formally Irrational Games, formed by a bunch of ex-Looking Glass people, where I worked for aw hile..)

..Al

What are the problems 360 owners have been having? I've seen a few people on my friends list have been playing this, but all i've heard is great praise, no complaints....yet.

I almost snagged a copy from Target today and was going to return the unopened one I ordered, but my GF said I should learn to master the art of patience.

I told her I was patiently going to send her TO THE MOON!!

Still... I didn't get it.

I hope I'm a better person for it BECAUSE I SURE WANNA PLAY IT!! Crappy girlfriends.

[remowilliams]

Albert, on Wed Aug 22, 2007 8:38 PM, said:

And on top of that it's using Sony's evil SecuRom copy protection that limits you to installing the game TWICE without jumping through hoops. I would NEVER buy the PC version after learning that, that sort of crap really pisses me off and the only people it will hinder are people who legitimately purchase the game.

OMFG, if that's the case they can go shit in their hat - there's NO WAY I'd consider buying the PC version then!

[StormSurge]

moycon, on Wed Aug 22, 2007 7:44 PM, said:

Albert, on Wed Aug 22, 2007 8:38 PM, said:

I have not picked this up yet, but there are apparently big problems with the PC release for many people (and even some people having problems with the 360 version). Tons of people having problems getting the game to run on the PC, as well as many issues with the game crashing frequently. And on top of that it's using Sony's evil SecuRom copy protection that limits you to installing the game TWICE without jumping through hoops. I would NEVER buy the PC version after learning that, that sort of crap really pisses me off and the only people it will hinder are people who legitimately purchase the game. Big strike in my eyes for 2K Boston (formally Irrational Games, formed by a bunch of ex-Looking Glass people, where I worked for aw hile..)

..Al

What are the problems 360 owners have been having? I've seen a few people on my friends list have been playing this, but all i've heard is great praise, no complaints....yet.

I almost snagged a copy from Target today and was going to return the unopened one I ordered, but my GF said I should learn to master the art of patience.

I told her I was patiently going to send her TO THE MOON!!

Still... I didn't get it.

I hope I'm a better person for it BECAUSE I SURE WANNA PLAY IT!! Crappy girlfriends.

Speaking of girlfriends & Bioshock, mine likes the game so much, I can only play it if she's watching me, as she doesn't want to miss anything. Come Friday night though, she'll be SOL as I stay up long past she will playing. She can catch up on my second go-round.

[swlovinist]

I have played the demo, I love it. Between Mass Effect, Bioshock, and Halo 3, Xbox 360 is going to have a great year!

[moycon]

This might be related to the 360 issues Albert was talking about...

Quote

"We understand there has been some concern about the implementation of widescreen mode in BioShock. Hopefully, we can clarify how we've chosen to do this.

The first thing we want to make clear is the mode we developed the game on and the optimal mode for playing the game is the widescreen mode. 90% of our development stations were widescreen displays: artists, programmers and designers.

BioShock was primarily developed and tuned for widescreen mode. Artists and designers worked with widescreen displays and chose a field of view (FOV) that best reflected their intentions with respect to the way the world is perceived, the perceived speed of movement of the player relative to the world and the amount of the world they wanted to be viewed for the best game-play experience. We went through dozens of iterations and finally settled upon a widescreen aspect ratio that best suited the gameplay experience.

When playing in widescreen modes the game makes use of the full screen resolution, and does not crop or stretch a lower resolution image into a wide screen one. For example, at 720p the game renders natively to the full 1280x720 resolution.


Once this FOV was established, we chose to keep exactly the same horizontal FOV for standard def displays, so as not to in any way alter the gameplay experience.


Instead of cropping the FOV for 4:3 displays and making all 4:3 owners mad in doing so, we slightly extended the vertical FOV for standard def mode: we never wanted to have black bars on people's displays. (This way, everybody is happy…) This does mean that people playing on a standard def display see slightly more vertical space, but, this does not significantly affect the game-play experience and, we felt that it best served our goal of keeping the game experience as close as possible to the original design and art vision on both types of displays. Reports of the widescreen FOV being a crop of the 4:3 FOV are completely false.

One thing we can assure you that all these decisions were made with the best interests of the game in mind. We didn't save any money or development time by choosing this set of parameters. We did what we thought was the best thing for the game: developing and optimizing it for widescreen displays, and making the decision not to do the usual crop for 4:3 displays. As a consumer, you certainly have the right to disagree.

We understand that not all users might not [sic] be happy with these choices and we will be looking into options for allowing users to adjust FOV settings manually. But as we mentioned earlier, changes to video game code do not happen in minutes or hours. We appreciate your understanding."

[2600Lives]

Well, here's how I view the whole piracy thing.

10 minutes after a game hits the shelves, it's gonna be dissected, cracked, and torrented for download. Even the most secure or frustrating security measures are going to be circumvented. The industry claims to lose HUGE sums of money from pirating. Ok, here's a solution.

Stop putting all these security measures in the games.

Why? Well, the game companies would likely save a LOT of money by simply not including these stupid measures in the games in the first place (especially if they're spending money on developing new security measures), so simply stop putting them in the games and it will even out. Good idea?

I for one refuse to buy games that HAVE to be validated online. I think it's bullshit. Even in today's connected world, not everyone has an internet connection (or, more likely, live someplace where firewalls limit their connectivity). So, if I get a game that I have to go online to Steam and validate it every week to play, that, to me, is utter crap. I will NOT buy said game. Period. I guess it's why I'll get a console version of a game over the PC anymore, as I can't stand the hassle of taking my legit copy through a hundred hoops just to play it, and, gawd forbid, if something happens and I can't install it or have to re-install, I have to go through yet MORE shit to play it. Uh-uh. Sony can stick SecureROM up their asses. I also hate stuff that won't let you play if you have burning programs installed. I use Alcohol for most of my burning needs because it's a good program, not because it allows me to copy this or copy that (NERO really sucks when trying to burn certain things. Everybody knows that.). Daemon Tools is also great as I can rip the ISO from one of my DVDs and watch it on my computer without wearing out my DVD drives (which are damned expensive), or I can play a game without keeping the disc in the drive, which is not something I like to do. Lots of people use these programs in legitimate ways because they are convenient and save wear and tear on expensive computer components. Ugh, I've ranted enough. In closing, BioShock rules!

[Lord Thag]

Yeah, online verification (staforce in particular) is bullshit. I had one (and only one) experience with it, and I will never again buy a game that uses it. Which is why I HAVE a 360, actually. I gave up on PC gaming awhile ago. Too much mucking around with drivers, installs, settings ... meh. I'll take a console anyday. Pop in a disk and off you go, and with and HDTV, you get to play it in an armchair on a giant screen instead of hunched over a desk on a 21' monitor.

Oh, and yeah, Bioshock continues to amaze me. Anyone get the 'Hypnotize Big Daddy' power yet. Heh. Nothing like having a lumbering juggernaut armed with a giant drill to get those slicers off your back! Freezing things and whacking them with a wrench is quite satisfying too.

So much fun....

[Albert]

Lord Thag, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 4:41 AM, said:

Yeah, online verification (staforce in particular) is bullshit. I had one (and only one) experience with it, and I will never again buy a game that uses it.

That's exactly how I feel. I bought a retail copy of Half-Life 2 when it came out. First, the registration servers were hammered and it took me hours before I could even start the game once I installed it. Next, when I did get into the game I experienced the terrible stuttering issue that affected many people (and which, as far as I know, Valve never did completely fix). It was bad enough that I decided to stop playing after a few hours into it. Some time later I replaced my motherboard and video card. Thinking I might no longer have the stuttering issue, I fired up Half-Life 2 again. Nope, the problem was still there!

So now I'm stuck with a game I can't enjoy, so I'll just sell it, right? Hell no, once you register it to your Steam account you're SOL, there's no selling it to someone else (unless you are clever enough to create a unique Steam account for each game you buy, OH BOY that's fun!) Great for Valve, of course, as it kills the second-hand market for games. Terrible for consumers. So I wasted $50 (plus tax) on a game I can't enjoy, can't return, and can't resell. This left such a bad taste in my mouth that I will NEVER buy another game that requires online activation. Can't wait to see what happens in 10 years when people want to play Bioshock on their PC and the SecuRom servers are gone and there's no way to activate the game.

These draconian copy protection measures are ultimately going to do more harm to the PC game industry than help it. The pirates will have their cracked copy of Bioshock within a week (if it's not already out there), and they won't have to deal with activation or worry about how many times they install the game before they are "locked out" from doing so. The people who purchased the game for $50 are the only ones who are going to run into these roadblocks. These measures will only drive people to pirate the game because they're so fed up with crap like this.

..Al

[Tempest]

Albert, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 9:51 AM, said:

These draconian copy protection measures are ultimately going to do more harm to the PC game industry than help it.

Maybe it's time to start the "bring back cartridges" campaign?

I think the future is going to be security dongles, like the old Atari ST software used to have. A USB Dongle of sometime or another. Of course that would be expensive.

Tempest

[Random Terrain]

I remember reading similar complaints about copy protection back when I had a Commodore 64 and then an Amiga. I hated dongles or looking up a specific word on a page of the instruction book before I could play. Makes you not want to buy anything but console games and that's pretty much what I did. I play emulated games and a few freeware games and free online games on my PC, but that's about it. It's my old Xbox for everything else. When I can trust the 360 enough to buy one, I'll start buying or renting games for that. Bioshock sure does sound like a game I would like.

[Oh yeah, F/A-18 Interceptor was the name of one of the games I had for the Amiga. It had a pain in the butt copy protection wheel. It might be better than what they are using now, but it still sucked. I just wanted to play the stupid game, I didn't want a homework assignment.]

Edited by Random Terrain, Thu Aug 23, 2007 9:42 AM.

[Albert]

Random Terrain, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 10:52 AM, said:

I remember reading similar complaints about copy protection back when I had a Commodore 64 and then an Amiga. I hated dongles or looking up a specific word on a page of the instruction book before I could play. Makes you not want to buy anything but console games and that's pretty much what I did. I play emulated games and a few freeware games and free online games on my PC, but that's about it. It's my old Xbox for everything else. When I can trust the 360 enough to buy one, I'll start buying or renting games for that. Bioshock sure does sound like I game I would like.

I'd rather have "client-based" copy protection that requires me to do something on my end (like enter a code) rather than the game having to hook up with some remote server over the internet. I really despise the fact that games like this cannot be resold and that some years down the road should the company go out of business, you won't even be able to install the game without having to hunt down a cracked version.

..Al

[Lord Thag]

Yeah, and you know what really sucks? All this protection crap interferes with the *legitimate* owners of the games, and not the pirates. Crackers and their ilk eventually break the protection, and get the game for free anyway. All this stuff does is piss of the legitimate owners. Theives get the damned game anyway, regardless of how in depth the protection is, eventually. It's stupid. It's not like these big companies are going broke off of the games anyway, and copy protection has *NEVER* been able to stop pirates anyway.

Stupid, is the operative word here.

[2600Lives]

Another thing I hate about certain protections is that they do things without your permission. Case in point, Quake 4. It will go online WITHOUT you either telling it to or giving it permission. I got my copy from a friend for 10 bucks. I don't care about the online aspect, so I install and it says the key is invalid. The damn thing checks to see if you have an internet connection, then without permission goes online to check it. That's crap, man! I had to disable my network connection just to play the stupid thing, then once I was done with it, I gave it back to my friend (and told him he could keep the 10 bucks), just because I don't like the idea of a damn game going online and checking ANYTHING without me telling it to. This is why there is no second market in the PC world. It'd be so very cool if I could walk into a GameXChange and pick up some used pc games on the cheap.

I also firmly believe that all the numbers the game, movie, and music industries post concerning how much money they lose due to piracy is so ballooned up that it's likely to be hundreds of times what they lose in reality. I mean, you know, Mr. Gaming Executive can't stand to lose that 30 bucks on a game, because he was gonna use that money to get his Porsche detailed. I love how they say it's the little guy that feels it the most, but that's not true, it's the greedy corporate bastards that feel it, because they NEED every single dollar they can get their hands on.

[NE146]

2600Lives, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 3:14 PM, said:

Another thing I hate about certain protections is that they do things without your permission. Case in point, Quake 4. It will go online WITHOUT you either telling it to or giving it permission. I got my copy from a friend for 10 bucks. I don't care about the online aspect, so I install and it says the key is invalid. The damn thing checks to see if you have an internet connection, then without permission goes online to check it. That's crap, man! I had to disable my network connection just to play the stupid thing, then once I was done with it, I gave it back to my friend (and told him he could keep the 10 bucks), just because I don't like the idea of a damn game going online and checking ANYTHING without me telling it to. This is why there is no second market in the PC world. It'd be so very cool if I could walk into a GameXChange and pick up some used pc games on the cheap.

Well really, that goes for any software. There is just naturally tons of software that "phone home" by default.

So, manage your network and just don't let them. Put a firewall up or something.. easy enough.

[Duke 4ever]

I agree with most people. This game is FANTASTIC! Best game I've played this year so far.

[Nuclear Pacman]

Picked this game up today after playing the demo on Live. Awesome atmosphere/environment, like an underwater Sky Captain world.

I didn't realize this was an M rated game, so I had to go to EB and I got pissed when the fat kid behind the counter asked for my ID. I gave him some shit but still bought the game, not much choice when it's not available in Target.

[2600Lives]

Not his fault you gotta show ID. It's the lawmakers bullshit.

[SINGLE TOOTH]

2600Lives, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 2:14 PM, said:

Another thing I hate about certain protections is that they do things without your permission. Case in point, Quake 4. It will go online WITHOUT you either telling it to or giving it permission. I got my copy from a friend for 10 bucks. I don't care about the online aspect, so I install and it says the key is invalid. The damn thing checks to see if you have an internet connection, then without permission goes online to check it. That's crap, man! I had to disable my network connection just to play the stupid thing, then once I was done with it, I gave it back to my friend (and told him he could keep the 10 bucks), just because I don't like the idea of a damn game going online and checking ANYTHING without me telling it to. This is why there is no second market in the PC world. It'd be so very cool if I could walk into a GameXChange and pick up some used pc games on the cheap.

I also firmly believe that all the numbers the game, movie, and music industries post concerning how much money they lose due to piracy is so ballooned up that it's likely to be hundreds of times what they lose in reality. I mean, you know, Mr. Gaming Executive can't stand to lose that 30 bucks on a game, because he was gonna use that money to get his Porsche detailed. I love how they say it's the little guy that feels it the most, but that's not true, it's the greedy corporate bastards that feel it, because they NEED every single dollar they can get their hands on.

Damn right.

I see some cool PC games sitting at goodwill, but I cant trust buying them. Not for $20 at least. THe serial is probably used up. I also hate when the game goes online without my approval. Bullshit

[SINGLE TOOTH]

Albert, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 10:05 AM, said:

Random Terrain, on Thu Aug 23, 2007 10:52 AM, said:

I remember reading similar complaints about copy protection back when I had a Commodore 64 and then an Amiga. I hated dongles or looking up a specific word on a page of the instruction book before I could play. Makes you not want to buy anything but console games and that's pretty much what I did. I play emulated games and a few freeware games and free online games on my PC, but that's about it. It's my old Xbox for everything else. When I can trust the 360 enough to buy one, I'll start buying or renting games for that. Bioshock sure does sound like I game I would like.

I'd rather have "client-based" copy protection that requires me to do something on my end (like enter a code) rather than the game having to hook up with some remote server over the internet. I really despise the fact that games like this cannot be resold and that some years down the road should the company go out of business, you won't even be able to install the game without having to hunt down a cracked version.

..Al

Oh, man. THat is what I really hate. It completely kills retro gaming in the future. Same thing with old versions of operating systems. What happens when they stop supporting them, and you have a legit copy you can't install in 10 years? So dumb. People still use obsolete equipment.