Throwback Review

Throwback review today. After beating Bioshock Infinite, I decided to play the other two in the series that I had never gotten around to beating. Everyone I spoke to about Infinite mentioned that there was a huge connection to Bioshock 1 and 2 in Infinite, so I decided to see if they were right or if they were just trying to push good games
 

 
Today, I'm going to talk about Bioshock. The story is set in 1960 - 48 years after the events of Infinite - in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. It begins in a plane flying over the ocean, but things take a turn for the worse when the plane crashes. From what is seen, it appears the player is the sole survivor. As you begin to move forward, you see a lighthouse and from there, you begin your descent into Rapture, the city of opportunity built by Andrew Ryan, the 'main' antagonist in this story.
 
When your bathysphere - the name for the main transportation within Rapture - arrives in the city, you see things are not as perfect as the ride down made it seem. After watching someone get murdered in front of you, the door to your sphere opens and you take your first hesitant steps into this hell.
 
Immediately as you arrive, you are introduced to Atlas, the only person who doesn't try to kill you as soon as they see you. He wants your help in finding and saving his wife and child, and that is what drives you through the first portion of the game.
 
The gameplay is what you'd expect from a shooter. The main difference is that you dual wield a gun and a plasmid (A genetic modification adapted from the stem cells of a sea slug), but you have to choose between which you have available at any time - switching between the two is quick, but guns sometimes need to be reloaded, which means a couple seconds until you can use them in combat.
 
As you progress, you are forced to begin harvesting ADAM from Little Sisters, children who have been modified to reclaim ADAM from corpses around Rapture. You are given the choice to save them (turning them back to normal little girls) or harvest them (which kills them in the process), and for the sake of my first playthrough, I saved them. I don't know whether there's a different ending depending on whether I saved or not, but I'll play again to be sure.
 
When you finally find Atlas's family, the submarine they are within explodes, sending Atlas into a rage. He then directs you to find and kill Andrew Ryan, the progenitor of this city. Once you find him, you learn that Atlas is actually a man named Frank Fontaine, the main rival of Andrew Ryan and a man who programmed you to do as you were commanded if the right words were spoken.
 
After breaking his hold over you and hunting Fontaine down (turning yourself into a Big Daddy - the protectors of the Little Sisters - in the process) you are treated to a scene (at least for saving the Sisters) in which it shows the Little Sisters growing up and having normal lives outside of Rapture.
 
From what I could tell from the game, there's no overt connection to Bioshock Infinite. If there is a connection between the first game and Infinite, it's very tenuous and hidden. I just started Bioshock 2, so we'll see if there's a connection hiding in there...