"If You Disagree That Bioshock is the Best Game in the World, You Are Wrong."
by Lisa Foiles

Before I begin, I must confess that this will likely be a difficult game for me to review objectively, since it is by far my favorite game in the known universe and it should be yours, too. In fact, I love it so much that when any gaming website says merely one negative thing about it, the thoughts in my head suddenly become a giant thunderous cloud of expletives which convert into run-on, incoherent lines of speech, causing anyone in my vicinity to either back away slowly or shout “The power of Christ compels you.”

RAPTURE: A beautiful, art-deco underwater city built by the mysterious and highly intelligent Andrew Ryan in the 1950’s. This is the setting for Bioshock.

However, this obviously once innovative and awe-inspiring city has gone completely bat-shit insane. Due to the citizens discovering the joys of plastic surgery and the surgeons discovering complete mental and psychological breakdowns, the Rapture dwellers have become, to put it kindly, freaks. And not just your average, everyday kind of freaks like the foul-smelling homeless ones that stumble around the sidewalks of Los Angeles screaming at you to stop breathing their air. No. We’re talking about a special variety of psychotic freaks known as “Splicers,” given this name as a result of the surgeons playing Picasso with their faces.

As you can already tell, I’m going into far too much detail. To more quickly sum up, you play as Jack, who under the direction of a man named Atlas is able to inject himself with “plasmids” in order to do away with Andrew Ryan and his devilish Splicers.

Here’s where it becomes all kinds of awesome.

By injecting the fluid in the plasmids, known as “Eve,” into your bloodstream, you are basically giving yourself superpowers. For example, the first plasmid you obtain allows you to zap enemies with electricity (think Emperor Palpatine’s “Force lightening”). Other plasmids allow you to incinerate your foes with fire, hurl objects at them with telekinesis, freeze them to death, or shoot a swarm of angry bees at them. THAT’S RIGHT. MOTHERF*CKING BEES.

Take super-human powers, guns, creepy (but not necessarily scary) villains, an inimitable setting, and an absolutely ingenious storyline, and you get Bioshock. So, obviously the presentation is top notch. Now, onto other features. The controls are that of your basic FPS with a bunch of different buttons to memorize the functions for. (What happened to the days of just two buttons: B for Jump and A for Awesome?)

Occasionally, it takes Jack way too long to reload his firearms, but before your jaw drops to the floor and you start pointing at me proclaiming that I just said something negative about the holiest of holy games and I’m clearly a big, stupid, poopy-panced hypocrite, remember that I feel that way about 99% of games. I hate reloading. It cheeses me off to no end. Similar to any FPS, I found that there were a few times when I was in a heated battle with a Big Daddy (a special villain who spends his days in Rapture tromping around in a large diving suit protecting possessed little girls known as “Little Sisters” while groaning like a foghorn) and just when I was about to teach him the meaning of pain surface-dweller style, Jack had to reload his current gun with approximately 15,000 bullets, one by one. Just a tad frustrating.

This review is already way too long, similar to the length of time it takes Jack to reload his guns. (Audience: OKAY. WE GET IT.) To sum things up, if you don’t own this game, shut off your computer, grab your keys, use your keys to start your car if you have a valid driver’s license, back your car out of its designated parking space, and, being sure to follow all traffic laws, drive to your nearest GameStop™ and PURCHASE BIOSHOCK NOW. If you don’t own a console on which to play Bioshock, PURCHASE THAT, TOO (splurge for the PS3). Until you have played this game, your life is incomplete. Your life is also incomplete if you haven’t tried Hershey’s™Bliss chocolate. Go ahead and pick up some of that at the store on your way home from purchasing Bioshock and your PS3. I’ll allow it.

Overall Rating: 10 out of 10