Finished. Thoughts and spoilers below.

It’s strange when a game that excels on so many levels ends on a misstep. After a week of spending some of each night in Rapture’s wonderfully crafted world, for things to finally come to a head in the form of a by-the-numbers, “wear the boss down, force him to recharge, hit him when he recharges, repeat” boss fight is a tremendous curveball – you don’t expect a game that so expertly defies so many videogame conventions to end on one of the biggest ever, and rightfully so. It doesn’t take away from the rest of the experience, or from the horrifying journey of self discovery (and more than a little self mutiliation) that makes up the last fourth before the big fight, though, and as generic boss fights go it was a good one – I even got to use the l33t hacker skills that saw me through so much of Rapture’s challenges one last time. That said, it was still just a generic boss fight, and it’s presence in Bioshock is genuinely puzzling.

The denouement immediately after was wonderful, though, and completely in keeping with the rest of the game’s dark sense of justice.

There’s at least more than one ending to Bioshock, and which one you get depends largely on how you handle the Little Sisters. To answer the question I sorta-kinda stepped around in my first post on the game: I harvested all but two of them, trading any hope they might have had at being normal again for the maximum amount of ADAM. The two Little Sisters I spared lucked out due to morbid curiousity a brief flutter of guilt after the game’s big moment, respectively, and I like to think they’ll remember me fondly for that. The downer ending I received says different. I’ve no complaints, though – I knew what I was getting in to from the beginning, and sealed my fate with that first push of the “X” button with only the tiniest bit of regret.

The final verdict? Game of The Year, hands down. Quite possibly Game of The Next Several Years, as it’ll probably be a good long while before anybody comes out with its equal. It’s not perfect – there are a few jarring moments story-wise, and while they’re eventually explained (mostly) some exposition from the voice on the other end of your radio wouldn’t have hurt. The hacking mini-game is something you’ll either love, put up with, or hate. It struck me as odd at first, but the more time I spent turning Rapture’s various security devices into my own robot guards of death the more I grew to like it. There are a few other things that could probably be picked at if you wanted to be well and truly annoying, but why would you? It’s a brilliant game, the sort that, in a perfect world, would silence all “games are art/not art” arguments once and for all. It makes me proud of the industry I work in and a little embarassed at the same time, and I hope it leaves a lot of other developers with the same feeling. Should all games be Bioshock? God, no. But in its wake there’s no excuses not take chances, to build on mechanics players are familiar with in exciting new directions. For all it’s art, this isn’t an “art game” like Rez or Shadow of the Colossus – it’s a shooter. The story is there if you want to engage with it, the consequences of your choices there to be weighed if you want to consider them, but if none of that interests you then hey, you still get to shoot stuff and brain folks with a wrench.

Irrational have a lot to be proud of. A company couldn’t ask for a finer swan song, and (in a just world) its universal acclaim and robust sales should help ensure that their new life as 2K-Boston/Australia will provide them with the support they need to pursue future projects without taking away any of the freedom they need to get there. In the meantime, there’s always more of Rapture to see, alternate endings to discover, and different play styles to try. I have Metroid Prime 3: Corruption waiting in the wings as the perfect shooty pallet cleanser, and then it’s back to Rapture for another go.

I genuinely can’t wait.

Filed under: Bioshock, Games