Bioshock

BioShock is a 2007 first-person shooter game developed by 2K Boston (later Irrational Games) and 2K Australia, and published by 2K Games. It is the first game in the BioShock series. The games concept was developed by Irrationals creative lead, Ken Levine, and incorporates ideas by 20th century dystopian and utopian thinkers such as Ayn Rand, George Orwell, and Aldous Huxley, as well as historical figures such as John D. Rockefeller and Walt Disney. The game is considered a spiritual successor to the System Shock series, on which many of Irrationals team, including Levine, had worked previously.

BioShock is set in 1960. The player guides the protagonist, Jack, after his airplane crashes in the ocean near the bathysphere terminus that leads to the underwater city of Rapture. Built by the business magnate Andrew Ryan, the city was intended to be an isolated utopia, but the discovery of ADAM, a genetic material which can be used to grant superhuman powers, initiated the citys turbulent decline. Jack tries to find a way to escape, fighting through hordes of ADAM-obsessed enemies, and the iconic, deadly Big Daddies, while engaging with the few sane humans that remain and eventually learning of Raptures past. The player, as Jack, can defeat foes in several ways by using weapons, utilizing plasmids that give unique powers, and by turning Raptures defenses against them. It was released for Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360 platforms in August 2007; a PlayStation 3 port by Irrational, 2K Marin, 2K Australia and Digital Extremes was released in October 2008, and an OS X port by Feral Interactive in October 2009. A scaled-down mobile version was developed by IG Fun, which contained the first few levels of the game.

BioShock includes elements of role-playing games, giving the player different approaches in engaging enemies such as by stealth, as well as moral choices of saving or killing characters. Additionally, the game and biopunk theme borrow concepts from the survival horror genre, notably the Resident Evil series.

BioShock received critical acclaim and was particularly praised by critics for its morality-based storyline, immersive environments, and its unique setting. It is considered to be one of the greatest video games of all time and a demonstration of video games as an art form. It received several Game of the Year awards from different media outlets, including from BAFTA, Game Informer, Spike TV, and X-Play.

Since its release a direct sequel has been released, BioShock 2 by 2K Marin, as well as a third game titled BioShock Infinite by Irrational Games. A remastered version of the original game was released on Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in September 2016, as part of BioShock: The Collection, along with BioShock 2 and Infinite. A standalone version of BioShock Remastered was released for macOS by Feral Interactive in August 2017. Releases of both the standalone remastered version along with The Collection for the Nintendo Switch were released in May 2020.