BioShock is a first-person shooter that lets players do things never before possible in the genre. Nearly everything in the game can be turned into a weapon; players can biologically modify their bodies with plasmids, hack devices and systems, upgrade weapons and craft new ammo variants, and experiment with different battle techniques.

Players enter the game as a castaway in Rapture, an underwater utopia torn apart by civil war. Caught between powerful forces and hunted down by genetically modified "splicers" and deadly security systems, players have to come to grips with a dangerous and mysterious world filled with powerful technology and fascinating characters. With multiple avenues for surmounting challenges on both a moral and tactical level, no encounter ever plays out the same and no two gamers will play BioShock the same way.