BioShock (series)
Encyclopedia
BioShock is a video game series developed by Irrational Games
—the first under the name 2K Boston/2K Australia—and designed by Ken Levine. It was originally released for the Windows
operating system and Xbox 360
video game console on 21 August 2007 in North America
, and three days later in Europe
and Australia
. A PlayStation 3
version of the game, which was developed by 2K Marin
, was released internationally on 17 October 2008 and in North America on 21 October 2008 with some additional features. The game was also released for the Mac OS X
operating system on October 7, 2009. A version of the game for mobile platforms is currently being developed by IG Fun. A sequel, BioShock 2
, was released on February 9, 2010. On August 12, 2010, Irrational Games
unveiled a trailer for a new game titled BioShock Infinite
, tentatively scheduled for release sometime in 2012. , the BioShock franchise has sold over 9 million copies.
about what influenced the game's story and setting, Levine said, "I have my useless liberal arts
degree, so I've read stuff from Ayn Rand
and George Orwell
, and all the sort of utopian and dystopian writings of the 20th century, which I've found really fascinating." Levine has also mentioned an interest in "stem cell research and the moral issues that go around[it] ." In regard to artistic influences, Levine cited the books Nineteen Eighty-Four
and Logan's Run
, representing societies that have "really interesting ideas screwed up by the fact that we're people."
According to the developers, BioShock is a spiritual successor to the System Shock
games, and was produced by former developers of that series. Levine claims his team had been thinking about making another game in the same vein since they produced System Shock 2
. In his narration of a video initially screened for the press at E3 2006, Levine pointed out many similarities between the games. There are several comparable gameplay elements: plasmids in BioShock supplied by "EVE hypos" serve the same function as "Psionic Abilities" supplied by "PSI hypos" in System Shock 2; the player needs to deal with security cameras, machine gun turrets, and hostile robotic drones, and has the ability to hack them in both games; ammunition conservation is stressed as "a key gameplay feature"; and audio tape recordings fulfil the same storytelling role that e-mail
logs did in the System Shock games. The "ghosts" (phantom images that replay tragic incidents in the places they occurred) from System Shock 2 also exist in BioShock, as do modifiable weapons with multiple ammunition types and researching enemies for increased damage. Additionally, Atlas guides the player along by radio, in much the same way Janice Polito does in System Shock 2, with each having a similar twist mid-game. Both games also give the player more than one method of completing tasks, allowing for emergent gameplay
.
In the reveal of the third game of the series, BioShock Infinte, Ken Levine stated that the name "BioShock" is not in reference to any specific setting or location, but instead a means of encapsulating common gameplay elements that reflects on their earlier games such as System Shock 2, and the BioShock series.
. Built in the late 1940s by business tycoon Andrew Ryan
, it was meant to be a laissez-faire
utopia for humanity's elite to work, live, and prosper out of the increasingly oppressive hands of the world's governments and authorities.
The scientists of Rapture soon discovered a substance called ADAM found in sea slug
s on the ocean's floor. With ADAM, they could create plasmids that would overwrite a person's genetic material, granting them superhuman-like abilities, and soon became a valuable commodity. They devised a means of harvesting ADAM using little girls, named "Little Sisters", implanting the sea slugs in their stomachs. ADAM was found to lead to mental instability in its users, and along with other political and social movements within Rapture, the Little Sisters became targets of those desiring more ADAM. To protect them, the scientists created Big Daddies
, mentally conditioned and mutated humans in armored diving suits that drove off any attackers from Little Sisters.
On the eve of 1959, war broke out in Rapture between its classes, fueled by ADAM-addicted "Splicers". The war left Rapture a dystopia
within a year, with the few non-ADAM users sheltering themselves from Splicers.
The protagonist of BioShock, whom the player controls throughout the game. Jack was a passenger on board an airplane that crashed near a lighthouse in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean
, and provided entry to the underwater city
. During his journey through Rapture, he encounters various gene altering substances, known as plasmids and Gene tonics, that he uses to defend himself. As Jack journeys through Rapture, he has strange visions of his family. Late in the game (to be precise, before he kills Andrew Ryan) he finds out that he is Ryan's illegitimate son, and was genetically conditioned to do whatever someone said if they used the phrase "would you kindly", which Atlas had used since the moment Jack and he met. Jack then kills Ryan and shuts down Rapture's self-destruct
switch, only to find out that Atlas is in fact Frank Fontaine: a notorious gangster and former leader of Rapture's black market. Escaping Rapture's automated defense systems, he ends up in the care of Dr. Tenenbaum, who frees him of his "trigger phrase
ailment".
Andrew Ryan
Atlas
Atlas serves as Jack's guide for the first two thirds of the game. Prior to his wife and child's entrapment in Neptune's Bounty, Atlas was attempting to flee the city. When Jack arrives in Rapture, he promises to help him escape under the condition he rescues his wife and child. However, it is soon revealed that he is actually Frank Fontaine and has been controlling Jack for his own will. (In a comment he makes near the end of the game, he implies that his wife and child, who were supposedly in a submarine that was detonated by Ryan, were simply a red herring.)
Frank Fontaine
Frank Fontaine is one of the primary antagonists in BioShock. He is a criminal mastermind, the arch-enemy of Andrew Ryan. He speaks with a coarse, thick Bronx accent. Unlike Ryan, he has no ideals regarding the city, and simply wishes to use it for money and power. Fontaine is very intelligent and has a skill for evasion.
Sander Cohen
Brigid Tenenbaum
Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum is a genetic scientist who helped originally develop ADAM. She is also the "mother" of the Little Sisters; she created them, and cares a great deal about their safety, calling them her "little ones", and acting like a mother towards them in protecting them. The player is able to win her allegiance by saving the Little Sisters instead of harvesting them for ADAM. She serves as Jack's guide throughout the final third of the game.
Subject Delta
Subject Delta is the protagonist of BioShock 2. Originally known as "Johnny Topside", he discovered Rapture. After being sent to prison, Delta became the first successful Big Daddy subject bonded to a Little Sister, Eleanor Lamb. This bond was capable of killing or inducing coma
if were it to be broken, which is what happened on New Year's Eve 1958 when Dr. Sofia Lamb forced Delta to commit suicide with the use of a pistol, reclaiming her daughter. Ten years later, 1968, Delta is revived by the now adolescent Eleanor Lamb with the use of a vita-chamber reprogrammed to his DNA. Delta is required to find Eleanor, thus repairing the bond between the two.
Augustus Sinclair
Eleanor Lamb
The daughter of Sofia Lamb, and a previous Little Sister. Roughly ten years after the 1958 New Year's Eve Riots she contacts Subject Delta, beginning the events of BioShock 2. Eleanor still remembers Delta after ten years and knows he is searching for her. Throughout the course of the game, she will leave him gifts and messages written on the walls of the city. In the story of BioShock 2, her behavior is influenced by Delta's actions towards the Little Sisters and NPCs.
Dr. Sofia Lamb
Dr. Sofia Lamb is the primary antagonist of BioShock 2. She has taken over Andrew Ryan's position as the leader of Rapture, albeit with a completely different ideological view revolving around collectivism. She uses her skills as a psychiatrist to brainwash most of the Splicers in the city, forming a cult known as "The Family". She sends out members of The Family to prevent Subject Delta from reuniting with Eleanor.
Little Sisters
Little Sisters (originally named as Gatherers) are young girls who have been genetically altered and mentally conditioned to reclaim ADAM from the corpses around Rapture. Little Sisters are always accompanied by a Big Daddy. The Little Sisters are almost completely immune to damage and have no offensive abilities. Approaching or attacking them, however, will incur the wrath of their Big Daddy protectors. When the player defeats these protectors, the player can choose either to harvest or rescue the Little Sisters, with consequences for the storyline. Little Sisters are usually hiding in the air vents hidden around Rapture, they will only come out when being called by a Big Daddy.
Big Sisters
The Big Sisters are post-pubescent Little Sisters that have become unstable in Rapture's environment. Ten years after the events of BioShock, they are charged with maintaining the ecological balance in Rapture. Their extreme level of powers, far beyond normal plasmid users, can be attributed to their bodies adapting the ADAM created in their bodies as children while they were still developing. Thus they have a much more natural affinity for the powers that ADAM creates.
Splicers
Splicers serve as the mainstay "infantry" within the BioShock series. These are humans who, through the excessive use of ADAM (people such as Jack seem to be able to use ADAM with no ill effect), have mutated into humanoids permanently endowed with various superpowers, but who are also murderously and irreversibly insane. Unlike the protagonists of the BioShock games, who can mix and match the powers given to them by the use of plasmids with near-limitless variety, Splicers fall into a set of different categories that give each splicer type a consistent but limited set of abilities and powers (Spider Splicers, Brute Splicers, Houdini Splicers, et al).
s with role-playing game
elements, and considered to be a spiritual successor to System Shock 2
, which many of the developers were previously involved with through Irrational Games
. The player controls a character as they explore Rapture, learning of the city's past and the fate of its citizens, defending themselves from attacks from Splicers along the way as they complete missions given to them by the few unaffected survivors. The player is given several options to approach many situations through combination of a number of game elements. The player collects an arsenal of weapons; weapons can be upgraded over course of play, and each can be loaded with different types of ammunition which can have different effects on different foes. The player also gains plasmid
s, ADAM-infused concoctions that grant the player active superhuman-like powers such as telekinesis or pyrokinesis
in addition to passive abilities such as increased speed or better damage resistance. The player can use weapons and plasmids in conjunction with the environment to set traps or to turn the security systems of Rapture against the player's enemies. For example, all enemies in a water-filled room can be shocked by electrocuting the water, sentry guns and cameras can be hacked to fire on detected Splicers, or explosive proximity traps can be set through the help of telekinesis.
As the player explores Rapture, they will come across health and EVE (the substance used to power plasmid-granted powers) recovery items, recording devices that reveal more of Rapture's history, and money. The money can be used at vending machines to acquire more ammunition or health and EVE items. Plasmids are purchased by collecting ADAM from Little Sisters after defeating the heavily armored Big Daddy that protects them. Both BioShock games give the player a choice of how to do this; the player can either safely extract the sea slug from the girl, earning a modest amount of ADAM and leaving the child alive, or they can kill the child, and extract a large amount of ADAM directly. Though the player can purchase numerous plasmids, they can only equip a limited number at any time, though devices throughout Rapture can allow the player to change this loadout at any time.
-based" storyline, immersive environment and Ayn Rand
-inspired dystopian back-story. According to Take-Two's chairman Strauss Zelnick, the game has sold around 3 million copies as of June 2009.
agent, Booker DeWitt, as he raids the air-city to rescue Elizabeth who has been imprisoned there since childhood. The player augments weapons and abilities with Elizabeth's own to aid their escape from the falling city.
, with a new release expected every two to three years. 2K's president Christoph Hartmann stated that BioShock could have 5 sequels, comparing the franchise to the Star Wars
movies.
format from 2K Games's official website. Until October 1, 2007, 2K Games was sending a printed version of the book to the owners of the collector's edition whose Big Daddy figurines had been broken, as compensation for the time it took to replace them. On October 31, 2008, the winners of "Breaking the Mold: Developers Edition Artbook Cover Contest" were announced on cultofrapture.com.
format, the score—composed by Garry Schyman
—contains 12 of the 22 tracks from the game. The Limited Edition version of the game came with the The Rapture EP remixes by Moby
and Oscar The Punk. The three remixed tracks on the CD include "Beyond the Sea," "God Bless the Child
" and "Wild Little Sisters"; the original recordings of these songs are in the game.
In BioShock, the player encounters phonograph
s that play music from the 1940s and 1950s as background music. In total, 30 licensed songs can be heard throughout the game.
BioShocks soundtrack was released on a vinyl LP with the BioShock 2 Special Edition
filming techniques as in the movie 300
to recreate the environments of Rapture. On May 9, 2008, Take-Two announced a deal with Universal Studios
to produce a BioShock movie, to be directed by Gore Verbinski
and written by John Logan
. The film was expected to be released in 2010, but was put on hold due to budget concerns. On August 24, 2009 it was revealed that Verbinski had dropped out of the project due to the studio's decision to film overseas to keep the budget under control. Verbinski reportedly feels this would have hindered his work on Rango
.
As of January 2010 the project is in pre-production stage, with Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
attached as director, with Braden Lynch, a voice artist from BioShock 2
, working on the film.
Gore Verbinski has since gone on record stating that the film is unlikely to be produced, due to studio concerns about funding a film with such a dark subject matter.
However, Ken Levine has stated that he would like to see a Bioshock film in the future.
, covering events in Rapture up to "a point before the first game" was published by Titan books on July 19, 2011.
Irrational Games
Irrational Games is a video game developer founded in 1997 by three former employees of Looking Glass Studios: Ken Levine, Jonathan Chey, and Robert Fermier as Irrational Games...
—the first under the name 2K Boston/2K Australia—and designed by Ken Levine. It was originally released for the Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
operating system and Xbox 360
Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 is the second video game console produced by Microsoft and the successor to the Xbox. The Xbox 360 competes with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
video game console on 21 August 2007 in North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
, and three days later in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
and Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. A PlayStation 3
PlayStation 3
The is the third home video game console produced by Sony Computer Entertainment and the successor to the PlayStation 2 as part of the PlayStation series. The PlayStation 3 competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles...
version of the game, which was developed by 2K Marin
2K Marin
2K Marin is an American and Australian video game developer based in Novato, California and Canberra, Australia. The studio's main focus according to press releases is to develop new intellectual property and co-develop products with other 2K studios....
, was released internationally on 17 October 2008 and in North America on 21 October 2008 with some additional features. The game was also released for the Mac OS X
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
operating system on October 7, 2009. A version of the game for mobile platforms is currently being developed by IG Fun. A sequel, BioShock 2
BioShock 2
BioShock 2 is a first-person shooter video game developed by 2K Marin for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The sequel to the 2007 video game BioShock, it was released worldwide on February 9, 2010....
, was released on February 9, 2010. On August 12, 2010, Irrational Games
Irrational Games
Irrational Games is a video game developer founded in 1997 by three former employees of Looking Glass Studios: Ken Levine, Jonathan Chey, and Robert Fermier as Irrational Games...
unveiled a trailer for a new game titled BioShock Infinite
BioShock Infinite
BioShock Infinite is an upcoming first-person shooter video game, and the third game in the BioShock series. Previously known as "Project Icarus", it is being developed by Irrational Games for a 2012 release on the Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 platforms...
, tentatively scheduled for release sometime in 2012. , the BioShock franchise has sold over 9 million copies.
Concept and development
In response to a question from the gaming website IGNIGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
about what influenced the game's story and setting, Levine said, "I have my useless liberal arts
Liberal arts
The term liberal arts refers to those subjects which in classical antiquity were considered essential for a free citizen to study. Grammar, Rhetoric and Logic were the core liberal arts. In medieval times these subjects were extended to include mathematics, geometry, music and astronomy...
degree, so I've read stuff from Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand was a Russian-American novelist, philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter. She is known for her two best-selling novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism....
and George Orwell
George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
, and all the sort of utopian and dystopian writings of the 20th century, which I've found really fascinating." Levine has also mentioned an interest in "stem cell research and the moral issues that go around
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is a dystopian novel about Oceania, a society ruled by the oligarchical dictatorship of the Party...
and Logan's Run
Logan's Run
Logan's Run is a novel by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson. Published in 1967, it depicts a dystopic ageist future society in which both population and the consumption of resources are maintained in equilibrium by requiring the death of everyone reaching a particular age...
, representing societies that have "really interesting ideas screwed up by the fact that we're people."
According to the developers, BioShock is a spiritual successor to the System Shock
System Shock
System Shock is a first-person action-adventure video game developed by Looking Glass Technologies and published by Origin Systems. Released in 1994, the game is set aboard the fictional Citadel Station in a cyberpunk vision of 2072...
games, and was produced by former developers of that series. Levine claims his team had been thinking about making another game in the same vein since they produced System Shock 2
System Shock 2
System Shock 2 is a 1999 first-person action role-playing video game, designed by Ken Levine for Microsoft Windows. The title is a sequel to the 1994 PC game System Shock, and was co-developed by Irrational Games and Looking Glass Studios...
. In his narration of a video initially screened for the press at E3 2006, Levine pointed out many similarities between the games. There are several comparable gameplay elements: plasmids in BioShock supplied by "EVE hypos" serve the same function as "Psionic Abilities" supplied by "PSI hypos" in System Shock 2; the player needs to deal with security cameras, machine gun turrets, and hostile robotic drones, and has the ability to hack them in both games; ammunition conservation is stressed as "a key gameplay feature"; and audio tape recordings fulfil the same storytelling role that e-mail
E-mail
Electronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
logs did in the System Shock games. The "ghosts" (phantom images that replay tragic incidents in the places they occurred) from System Shock 2 also exist in BioShock, as do modifiable weapons with multiple ammunition types and researching enemies for increased damage. Additionally, Atlas guides the player along by radio, in much the same way Janice Polito does in System Shock 2, with each having a similar twist mid-game. Both games also give the player more than one method of completing tasks, allowing for emergent gameplay
Emergent gameplay
Emergent gameplay refers to complex situations in video games, board games, or table top role-playing games that emerge from the interaction of relatively simple game mechanics....
.
In the reveal of the third game of the series, BioShock Infinte, Ken Levine stated that the name "BioShock" is not in reference to any specific setting or location, but instead a means of encapsulating common gameplay elements that reflects on their earlier games such as System Shock 2, and the BioShock series.
Overview
BioShock and BioShock 2 take place in the fictional underwater city of RaptureRapture (BioShock)
Rapture is an underwater city that is the setting for the games BioShock and BioShock 2. The game's back-story describes the city as envisioned by business tycoon Andrew Ryan in the mid-1940s as a means to create a utopia for mankind's greatest thinkers to prosper in a laissez-faire environment...
. Built in the late 1940s by business tycoon Andrew Ryan
Andrew Ryan (BioShock)
Andrew Ryan is a fictional character in the 2007 video game BioShock. The character has received significant praise from critics, and so has his voice actor, Armin Shimerman, whose voice talent was cited as one of the contributing factors to BioShock and won "Best use of sound" from IGN...
, it was meant to be a laissez-faire
Laissez-faire
In economics, laissez-faire describes an environment in which transactions between private parties are free from state intervention, including restrictive regulations, taxes, tariffs and enforced monopolies....
utopia for humanity's elite to work, live, and prosper out of the increasingly oppressive hands of the world's governments and authorities.
The scientists of Rapture soon discovered a substance called ADAM found in sea slug
Sea slug
Sea slug is a common name used for several different groups of saltwater snails that either lack a shell or have only an internal shell, in other words this name is used for various lineages of marine gastropod mollusks that are either not conchiferous or appear not to be.The phrase "sea slug" is...
s on the ocean's floor. With ADAM, they could create plasmids that would overwrite a person's genetic material, granting them superhuman-like abilities, and soon became a valuable commodity. They devised a means of harvesting ADAM using little girls, named "Little Sisters", implanting the sea slugs in their stomachs. ADAM was found to lead to mental instability in its users, and along with other political and social movements within Rapture, the Little Sisters became targets of those desiring more ADAM. To protect them, the scientists created Big Daddies
Big Daddy (BioShock)
A Big Daddy is a fictional character in the BioShock series of video games. Designed by 2K Boston/2K Australia, they first appeared in BioShock and were promoted heavily...
, mentally conditioned and mutated humans in armored diving suits that drove off any attackers from Little Sisters.
On the eve of 1959, war broke out in Rapture between its classes, fueled by ADAM-addicted "Splicers". The war left Rapture a dystopia
Dystopia
A dystopia is the idea of a society in a repressive and controlled state, often under the guise of being utopian, as characterized in books like Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four...
within a year, with the few non-ADAM users sheltering themselves from Splicers.
Characters
JackThe protagonist of BioShock, whom the player controls throughout the game. Jack was a passenger on board an airplane that crashed near a lighthouse in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions. With a total area of about , it covers approximately 20% of the Earth's surface and about 26% of its water surface area...
, and provided entry to the underwater city
Rapture (BioShock)
Rapture is an underwater city that is the setting for the games BioShock and BioShock 2. The game's back-story describes the city as envisioned by business tycoon Andrew Ryan in the mid-1940s as a means to create a utopia for mankind's greatest thinkers to prosper in a laissez-faire environment...
. During his journey through Rapture, he encounters various gene altering substances, known as plasmids and Gene tonics, that he uses to defend himself. As Jack journeys through Rapture, he has strange visions of his family. Late in the game (to be precise, before he kills Andrew Ryan) he finds out that he is Ryan's illegitimate son, and was genetically conditioned to do whatever someone said if they used the phrase "would you kindly", which Atlas had used since the moment Jack and he met. Jack then kills Ryan and shuts down Rapture's self-destruct
Self-destruct
A self-destruct is a mechanism which causes a device to destroy itself under a predefined set of circumstances.Self-destruct mechanisms are also found on devices and systems where malfunction could endanger large numbers of people...
switch, only to find out that Atlas is in fact Frank Fontaine: a notorious gangster and former leader of Rapture's black market. Escaping Rapture's automated defense systems, he ends up in the care of Dr. Tenenbaum, who frees him of his "trigger phrase
Mind control
Mind control refers to a process in which a group or individual "systematically uses unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulator, often to the detriment of the person being manipulated"...
ailment".
Andrew Ryan
Atlas
Atlas serves as Jack's guide for the first two thirds of the game. Prior to his wife and child's entrapment in Neptune's Bounty, Atlas was attempting to flee the city. When Jack arrives in Rapture, he promises to help him escape under the condition he rescues his wife and child. However, it is soon revealed that he is actually Frank Fontaine and has been controlling Jack for his own will. (In a comment he makes near the end of the game, he implies that his wife and child, who were supposedly in a submarine that was detonated by Ryan, were simply a red herring.)
Frank Fontaine
Frank Fontaine is one of the primary antagonists in BioShock. He is a criminal mastermind, the arch-enemy of Andrew Ryan. He speaks with a coarse, thick Bronx accent. Unlike Ryan, he has no ideals regarding the city, and simply wishes to use it for money and power. Fontaine is very intelligent and has a skill for evasion.
Sander Cohen
Brigid Tenenbaum
Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum is a genetic scientist who helped originally develop ADAM. She is also the "mother" of the Little Sisters; she created them, and cares a great deal about their safety, calling them her "little ones", and acting like a mother towards them in protecting them. The player is able to win her allegiance by saving the Little Sisters instead of harvesting them for ADAM. She serves as Jack's guide throughout the final third of the game.
Subject Delta
Subject Delta is the protagonist of BioShock 2. Originally known as "Johnny Topside", he discovered Rapture. After being sent to prison, Delta became the first successful Big Daddy subject bonded to a Little Sister, Eleanor Lamb. This bond was capable of killing or inducing coma
Coma
In medicine, a coma is a state of unconsciousness, lasting more than 6 hours in which a person cannot be awakened, fails to respond normally to painful stimuli, light or sound, lacks a normal sleep-wake cycle and does not initiate voluntary actions. A person in a state of coma is described as...
if were it to be broken, which is what happened on New Year's Eve 1958 when Dr. Sofia Lamb forced Delta to commit suicide with the use of a pistol, reclaiming her daughter. Ten years later, 1968, Delta is revived by the now adolescent Eleanor Lamb with the use of a vita-chamber reprogrammed to his DNA. Delta is required to find Eleanor, thus repairing the bond between the two.
Augustus Sinclair
Eleanor Lamb
The daughter of Sofia Lamb, and a previous Little Sister. Roughly ten years after the 1958 New Year's Eve Riots she contacts Subject Delta, beginning the events of BioShock 2. Eleanor still remembers Delta after ten years and knows he is searching for her. Throughout the course of the game, she will leave him gifts and messages written on the walls of the city. In the story of BioShock 2, her behavior is influenced by Delta's actions towards the Little Sisters and NPCs.
Dr. Sofia Lamb
Dr. Sofia Lamb is the primary antagonist of BioShock 2. She has taken over Andrew Ryan's position as the leader of Rapture, albeit with a completely different ideological view revolving around collectivism. She uses her skills as a psychiatrist to brainwash most of the Splicers in the city, forming a cult known as "The Family". She sends out members of The Family to prevent Subject Delta from reuniting with Eleanor.
Enemies
Big DaddiesLittle Sisters
Little Sisters (originally named as Gatherers) are young girls who have been genetically altered and mentally conditioned to reclaim ADAM from the corpses around Rapture. Little Sisters are always accompanied by a Big Daddy. The Little Sisters are almost completely immune to damage and have no offensive abilities. Approaching or attacking them, however, will incur the wrath of their Big Daddy protectors. When the player defeats these protectors, the player can choose either to harvest or rescue the Little Sisters, with consequences for the storyline. Little Sisters are usually hiding in the air vents hidden around Rapture, they will only come out when being called by a Big Daddy.
Big Sisters
The Big Sisters are post-pubescent Little Sisters that have become unstable in Rapture's environment. Ten years after the events of BioShock, they are charged with maintaining the ecological balance in Rapture. Their extreme level of powers, far beyond normal plasmid users, can be attributed to their bodies adapting the ADAM created in their bodies as children while they were still developing. Thus they have a much more natural affinity for the powers that ADAM creates.
Splicers
Splicers serve as the mainstay "infantry" within the BioShock series. These are humans who, through the excessive use of ADAM (people such as Jack seem to be able to use ADAM with no ill effect), have mutated into humanoids permanently endowed with various superpowers, but who are also murderously and irreversibly insane. Unlike the protagonists of the BioShock games, who can mix and match the powers given to them by the use of plasmids with near-limitless variety, Splicers fall into a set of different categories that give each splicer type a consistent but limited set of abilities and powers (Spider Splicers, Brute Splicers, Houdini Splicers, et al).
Gameplay
Both games in the BioShock series are first-person shooterFirst-person shooter
First-person shooter is a video game genre that centers the gameplay on gun and projectile weapon-based combat through first-person perspective; i.e., the player experiences the action through the eyes of a protagonist. Generally speaking, the first-person shooter shares common traits with other...
s with role-playing game
Role-playing game
A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting, or through a process of structured decision-making or character development...
elements, and considered to be a spiritual successor to System Shock 2
System Shock 2
System Shock 2 is a 1999 first-person action role-playing video game, designed by Ken Levine for Microsoft Windows. The title is a sequel to the 1994 PC game System Shock, and was co-developed by Irrational Games and Looking Glass Studios...
, which many of the developers were previously involved with through Irrational Games
Irrational Games
Irrational Games is a video game developer founded in 1997 by three former employees of Looking Glass Studios: Ken Levine, Jonathan Chey, and Robert Fermier as Irrational Games...
. The player controls a character as they explore Rapture, learning of the city's past and the fate of its citizens, defending themselves from attacks from Splicers along the way as they complete missions given to them by the few unaffected survivors. The player is given several options to approach many situations through combination of a number of game elements. The player collects an arsenal of weapons; weapons can be upgraded over course of play, and each can be loaded with different types of ammunition which can have different effects on different foes. The player also gains plasmid
Plasmid
In microbiology and genetics, a plasmid is a DNA molecule that is separate from, and can replicate independently of, the chromosomal DNA. They are double-stranded and, in many cases, circular...
s, ADAM-infused concoctions that grant the player active superhuman-like powers such as telekinesis or pyrokinesis
Pyrokinesis
Pyrokinesis, derived from the Greek words and , was the name coined by horror novelist Stephen King for the ability to create or to control fire with the mind that he gave to the protagonist Charlie McGee in Firestarter...
in addition to passive abilities such as increased speed or better damage resistance. The player can use weapons and plasmids in conjunction with the environment to set traps or to turn the security systems of Rapture against the player's enemies. For example, all enemies in a water-filled room can be shocked by electrocuting the water, sentry guns and cameras can be hacked to fire on detected Splicers, or explosive proximity traps can be set through the help of telekinesis.
As the player explores Rapture, they will come across health and EVE (the substance used to power plasmid-granted powers) recovery items, recording devices that reveal more of Rapture's history, and money. The money can be used at vending machines to acquire more ammunition or health and EVE items. Plasmids are purchased by collecting ADAM from Little Sisters after defeating the heavily armored Big Daddy that protects them. Both BioShock games give the player a choice of how to do this; the player can either safely extract the sea slug from the girl, earning a modest amount of ADAM and leaving the child alive, or they can kill the child, and extract a large amount of ADAM directly. Though the player can purchase numerous plasmids, they can only equip a limited number at any time, though devices throughout Rapture can allow the player to change this loadout at any time.
BioShock
BioShock was released on August 21, 2007 exclusively to Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360. A PlayStation 3 port was released just over a year later on October 17, 2008. The game received overwhelmingly positive reviews, which praised its "moralityMorality
Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...
-based" storyline, immersive environment and Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand was a Russian-American novelist, philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter. She is known for her two best-selling novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism....
-inspired dystopian back-story. According to Take-Two's chairman Strauss Zelnick, the game has sold around 3 million copies as of June 2009.
BioShock 2
BioShock 2, the much anticipated sequel to BioShock, was released on February 9, 2010 in North America. The game was developed by a new design team, although it contained members of the team for the original BioShock, and it received positive reviews.BioShock Infinite
BioShock Infinite was announced on August 12, 2010, for release on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Microsoft Windows systems sometime in 2012. Previously known as "Project Icarus", BioShock Infinite is not a direct sequel or prequel to the original game, but carries many of the same gameplay concepts from the BioShock title. The game takes place in 1912 (prior to the events of the other games), in the air-city of Columbia. In the game, the player controls an ex-PinkertonPinkerton National Detective Agency
The Pinkerton National Detective Agency, usually shortened to the Pinkertons, is a private U.S. security guard and detective agency established by Allan Pinkerton in 1850. Pinkerton became famous when he claimed to have foiled a plot to assassinate president-elect Abraham Lincoln, who later hired...
agent, Booker DeWitt, as he raids the air-city to rescue Elizabeth who has been imprisoned there since childhood. The player augments weapons and abilities with Elizabeth's own to aid their escape from the falling city.
BioShock Vita
Ken Levine announced during Sony's 2011 E3 press conference that a BioShock game would be developed for PlayStation Vita, stating that it will be an original project for the handheld system.Future
In response to the game's high sales and critical acclaim, Take-Two chairman Strauss Zelnick revealed in a conference call to analysts that the company now considered the game as part of a franchise. He also speculated on any follow-ups mimicking the development cycle of Grand Theft AutoGrand Theft Auto (series)
Grand Theft Auto is a multi-award-winning British video game series created in the United Kingdom by Dave Jones, then later by brothers Dan Houser and Sam Houser, and game designer Zachary Clarke. It is primarily developed by Edinburgh based Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games...
, with a new release expected every two to three years. 2K's president Christoph Hartmann stated that BioShock could have 5 sequels, comparing the franchise to the Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
movies.
Art book
BioShock: Breaking the Mold, a book containing artwork from the game, was released by 2K Games on August 13, 2007. It is available in both low and high resolution, in PDFPortable Document Format
Portable Document Format is an open standard for document exchange. This file format, created by Adobe Systems in 1993, is used for representing documents in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems....
format from 2K Games's official website. Until October 1, 2007, 2K Games was sending a printed version of the book to the owners of the collector's edition whose Big Daddy figurines had been broken, as compensation for the time it took to replace them. On October 31, 2008, the winners of "Breaking the Mold: Developers Edition Artbook Cover Contest" were announced on cultofrapture.com.
Soundtrack
2K Games released an orchestral score soundtrack on their official homepage on August 24, 2007. Available in MP3MP3
MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III, more commonly referred to as MP3, is a patented digital audio encoding format using a form of lossy data compression...
format, the score—composed by Garry Schyman
Garry Schyman
Garry Schyman is an American film, television, and video game music composer. He graduated from the University of Southern California with a degree in music composition in 1978, and began work in the television industry, writing music for such television series as Magnum, P.I. and The A-Team. By...
—contains 12 of the 22 tracks from the game. The Limited Edition version of the game came with the The Rapture EP remixes by Moby
Moby
Richard Melville Hall , better known by his stage name Moby, is an American musician, DJ, and photographer. He is known mainly for his sample-based electronic music and his outspoken liberal political views, including his support of veganism and animal rights.Moby gained attention in the early...
and Oscar The Punk. The three remixed tracks on the CD include "Beyond the Sea," "God Bless the Child
God Bless the Child (Billie Holiday song)
"God Bless the Child" is a song written by Billie Holiday and Arthur Herzog, Jr. in 1939, first recorded on May 9, 1941 under the Okeh label.Holiday's version of the song was honored with the Grammy Hall of Fame Award in...
" and "Wild Little Sisters"; the original recordings of these songs are in the game.
In BioShock, the player encounters phonograph
Phonograph
The phonograph record player, or gramophone is a device introduced in 1877 that has had continued common use for reproducing sound recordings, although when first developed, the phonograph was used to both record and reproduce sounds...
s that play music from the 1940s and 1950s as background music. In total, 30 licensed songs can be heard throughout the game.
BioShocks soundtrack was released on a vinyl LP with the BioShock 2 Special Edition
Film
Industry rumors after the game's release suggested a film adaptation of the game would be made, utilizing similar green screenGreen Screen
The Green Screen international wildlife film festival is held annually in Eckernförde, Germany. The festival shows full-length and short nature documentaries about animals in their natural habitat. It is the only festival of its kind in Germany...
filming techniques as in the movie 300
300 (film)
300 is a 2007 American fantasy action film based on the 1998 comic series of the same name by Frank Miller. It is a fictionalized retelling of the Battle of Thermopylae. The film was directed by Zack Snyder, while Miller served as executive producer and consultant...
to recreate the environments of Rapture. On May 9, 2008, Take-Two announced a deal with Universal Studios
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
to produce a BioShock movie, to be directed by Gore Verbinski
Gore Verbinski
Gregor "Gore" Verbinski is an American film director, writer and musician. He is best known for directing the films The Ring, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Rango.-Early life:...
and written by John Logan
John Logan (writer)
John David Logan is an American screenwriter, playwright and film producer.-Personal life:Logan was born in San Diego on September 24, 1961. His parents emigrated to the US from Northern Ireland via Canada. The youngest of three children, he has an older brother and sister...
. The film was expected to be released in 2010, but was put on hold due to budget concerns. On August 24, 2009 it was revealed that Verbinski had dropped out of the project due to the studio's decision to film overseas to keep the budget under control. Verbinski reportedly feels this would have hindered his work on Rango
Rango (2011 film)
Rango is a 2011 American computer-animated Western Comedy film directed by Gore Verbinski and produced by Graham King. In the film, a chameleon named Rango accidentally ends up in the town of Dirt, an outpost that is in desperate need of a new sheriff...
.
As of January 2010 the project is in pre-production stage, with Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Juan Carlos Fresnadillo is a Spanish film director, script writer, and producer. He directed Intacto and 28 Weeks Later, the sequel to Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later. His film Esposados was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film in 1996.-Early life:Fresnadillo was born in...
attached as director, with Braden Lynch, a voice artist from BioShock 2
BioShock 2
BioShock 2 is a first-person shooter video game developed by 2K Marin for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The sequel to the 2007 video game BioShock, it was released worldwide on February 9, 2010....
, working on the film.
Gore Verbinski has since gone on record stating that the film is unlikely to be produced, due to studio concerns about funding a film with such a dark subject matter.
However, Ken Levine has stated that he would like to see a Bioshock film in the future.
Novel
BioShock: Rapture, written by John ShirleyJohn Shirley
John Shirley is an American fantasist, author of noir fiction, and science-fiction writer. Shirley is a prolific writer of novels and short stories, TV scripts and screenplays who has published over 30 books and 10 collections...
, covering events in Rapture up to "a point before the first game" was published by Titan books on July 19, 2011.