After watching again the opening to 2K Boston's Bioshock for the first time since I played it back in August 2007, it shot instantly into contention for my favourite opening, and the most impressive thing about that is the fact I was only watching, not playing. The first moments of this game are the epitome of the interactive opening sequence; favoured invariably by first person games as they allow the player to experience the character's situation as if it was through their own eyes.
The briefest of background info on the unnamed protagonist serves as the calm before the storm, as the plane he is travelling in soon begins crashing out of the sky. This is comunicated to us through sound as the games' title logo appears on screen. Imaculate at first, it soon rusts and decays as water washes over it, making for a subtle precursor to what we're about to encounter as we descend into the underwater city of Rapture.
Suddenly our focus is again through the eyes of the protagonist, who manages to avoid drowning and swim through the fire & debris of the crash towards a mysterious tower - the only piece of dry land seemingly for miles. After entering we're soon dropping fathoms below the surface in a bathysphere (making our hero clearly more driven by curiosity than common sense given that he nearly drowned mere seconds ago), and after a foreboding speach from the megalomaniac genius behind Rapture, Andrew Ryan, we're treated to an absolutely jaw dropping first look at his greatest creation. All looks relatively well as make our initial approach, but slight imperfections like sparking electronics provide a hint at what's to come. It's intriguing, mesmerising and just completely fucking cool in equal measure. Bioshock's art direction is as good as it's ever been in gaming right from the off.
The brilliance of this whole experience is that the choices for survival that you make in heading into Rapture seem completely organic, despite the fact Ken Levine & Co are quite clearly pulling the strings. As you delve further and further into the murky reality of one man's crazy dream gone horribly wrong in what is genuinely a modern masterpiece, it becomes apparent that this wonderfully delivered opening makes a perfect metaphor for how the narrative develops. Games as well designed as this only come around a handful of times every console generation, and it's clear right from the beginning that this one is special. I have no doubt it will stand the test of time long after the cut & paste FPS bubble has burst.
The briefest of background info on the unnamed protagonist serves as the calm before the storm, as the plane he is travelling in soon begins crashing out of the sky. This is comunicated to us through sound as the games' title logo appears on screen. Imaculate at first, it soon rusts and decays as water washes over it, making for a subtle precursor to what we're about to encounter as we descend into the underwater city of Rapture.
Suddenly our focus is again through the eyes of the protagonist, who manages to avoid drowning and swim through the fire & debris of the crash towards a mysterious tower - the only piece of dry land seemingly for miles. After entering we're soon dropping fathoms below the surface in a bathysphere (making our hero clearly more driven by curiosity than common sense given that he nearly drowned mere seconds ago), and after a foreboding speach from the megalomaniac genius behind Rapture, Andrew Ryan, we're treated to an absolutely jaw dropping first look at his greatest creation. All looks relatively well as make our initial approach, but slight imperfections like sparking electronics provide a hint at what's to come. It's intriguing, mesmerising and just completely fucking cool in equal measure. Bioshock's art direction is as good as it's ever been in gaming right from the off.
The brilliance of this whole experience is that the choices for survival that you make in heading into Rapture seem completely organic, despite the fact Ken Levine & Co are quite clearly pulling the strings. As you delve further and further into the murky reality of one man's crazy dream gone horribly wrong in what is genuinely a modern masterpiece, it becomes apparent that this wonderfully delivered opening makes a perfect metaphor for how the narrative develops. Games as well designed as this only come around a handful of times every console generation, and it's clear right from the beginning that this one is special. I have no doubt it will stand the test of time long after the cut & paste FPS bubble has burst.
