Gold: Bioshock

[TQ]

From Blue's News:

There's a Q&A with Ken Levine on Level Up discussing BioShock and its recent Game Critics' award for /beta action/adventure game at E3. Included in the conversation is the off-hand revelation that Irrational's eagerly anticipated first-person shooter is gold. Though there are no further details, the game's release date as established as August 21 several months ago (story). This news is hashed out a bit in the 2K Forums (thanks L.T.). In lieu of an official gold announcement, here's Ken's description of how they are celebrating this milestone:

"We just had a team party in Boston, and then we have a event on the launch night on August 20th, which we’re inviting lots of people to, including members of the BioShock fan community. I'm actually looking forward to that, because launches are usually such abstract things. You wake up launch morning and it’s like, "Hey, our game has, umm, shipped to retail!" It’s not exactly like headlining at Madison Square Garden."

[TQ]

My life has just become a Carley Simon hit song...

[shaihulud]

This is a good move by them. The reason as to why I see this is due to the fact that other expected blockbuster releases will not still market from each other. I just may get this now. To give me something to ease the wait for my other games I am waiting for.

[TQ]

I think you might find that you measure all the other games by this one. Bioshock is the one game I have the most anticipation for. Oh, sure I'll get excited hearing that Hellgate's gone gold, too, but Bioshock is the spiritual successor to System Shock 2, one of my all time favorite games.

I think I need to head over to my friendly, neighborhood Electronic B - sorry, now it's GameStop - and preorder.

[polonyc2]

great news about BioShock...this is the official start of gaming nirvana for the next few months---BioShock in August, Half Life 2: Episode 2 on October 9th, Hellgate: London on October 31st and Crysis on November 16th (all confirmed dates)...good to see they spaced out the release dates as well...plus we also get Medal of Honor: Airborne on September 4th and Need for Speed: ProStreet on October 30th

Originally Posted by TQ

Oh, sure I'll get excited hearing that Hellgate's gone gold, too

Hellgate: London has already received a firm release date of October 31st....

http://www.hellgatelondon.com/news/view/83/#fancy_panel

[zapionics<alt>]

Well I sure hope Bioshock turns out to be fun. I think these stylised shooters can be a hoot, I really enjoyed Serious Sam (the original) a lot and Painkiller was fun too.

If the storyline is as interesting as they claim and the psychological thriller aspect is done well despite its shooter basis then this could be a pivotal game.

I still remember my intense dissapointment at American McGees Alice tho, so I wont get my hopes up too high.

Now I have a bit of a problem; if the game turns out to be good then I may have to bring my new gaming rig build forward in order to play it with DX10(.x), otherwise I will be playing it on Dx9. I wonder how much difference there is between the rendering paths in the game (especially with those water effects)? I dont realy want to build a new rig just yet, I'm waiting for the new chipsets CPU's (which hopefully will have ready for Crysis), but I also dont want to lose any eye candy by playing these new games on Dx9.

[TQ]

Remember, many of the guys that worked on BioShock also did System Shock 2.
I don't think of Painkiller or Serious Sam in quite the same category.
Bioshock is going to be more of a Deus Ex level game.

[TQ]

Originally Posted by polonyc2

Hellgate: London has already received a firm release date of October 31st....

A distinctly appropriate release date.
I've been reading the first several issues of the Hellgate comic book. It's not bad. Not classic like Powers or Fables but not bad.

[zapionics<alt>]

Originally Posted by TQ

...
I don't think of Painkiller or Serious Sam in quite the same category.
Bioshock is going to be more of a Deus Ex level game.

My comment was just in relation to the stylised graphics. As I said, if the storyline is as good as they say then this will be a top game.

I'm pretty concerned about the Dx10x/Dx9 issue tho.

[traveler]

Originally Posted by zapionics<alt>

[snip]

Now I have a bit of a problem; if the game turns out to be good then I may have to bring my new gaming rig build forward in order to play it with DX10(.x), otherwise I will be playing it on Dx9. I wonder how much difference there is between the rendering paths in the game (especially with those water effects)? I dont realy want to build a new rig just yet, I'm waiting for the new chipsets CPU's (which hopefully will have ready for Crysis), but I also dont want to lose any eye candy by playing these new games on Dx9.

Same thought here.

I want hardware to advance just a bit more before I do my next build. If Crysis is truley on the shelf Nov 16, then I'll have to look at what's available Nov 17 in the hardware world and think about it.



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[TQ]

BioShock is a DX9 game only, so all those cool water effects will be as cool as the developers intended on a DX9 capable box.

Here are the system specs:

BIOSHOCK PC SPECIFICATIONS

Operating Systems:
Windows XP (with Service Pack 2) or
Windows Vista


Minimum System Requirements:
CPU: Pentium 4 2.4GHz Single Core processor

System RAM: 1GB

Video Card: Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 128MB RAM (NVIDIA 6600 or better/ATI X1300 or better, excluding ATI X1550).

Sound Card: 100% direct X 9.0c compatible sound card

Hard disc space: 8GB free space


Recommended System Requirements:
CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo processor

System RAM: 2GB

Video card:
DX9: Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 512MB RAM (NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT or better)
DX10: NVIDIA GeForce 8600 or better

Sound Card: Sound Blaster® X-Fi™ series (Optimized for use with Creative Labs EAX ADVANCED HD 4.0 or EAX ADVANCED HD 5.0 compatible sound cards)

Important Note: Game requires Internet connection for activation

Sweet, n'est ce pas?

[TQ]

Originally Posted by traveler

Same thought here.

I want hardware to advance just a bit more before I do my next build. If Crysis is truley on the shelf Nov 16, then I'll have to look at what's available Nov 17 in the hardware world and think about it.

Might want to take a look at this thread before you do any shopping:

DX10 hardware is already obsolete...

[polonyc2]

Originally Posted by TQ

BioShock is a DX9 game only, so all those cool water effects will be as cool as the developers intended on a DX9 capable box.

BioShock is DX10 as well...I don't know if it was coded with DX10 from the beginning or if they will be adding a DX10 patch...but the game will definitely support DX10

Q & A

How much of the DX10 technology will you be using for water effects?

JJ: All the water effects in the game were developed to work on both DX9 and DX10 technology. Where applicable DX10 is used to accelerate the performance of some of the effects, and this may allow more detailed water in some areas.

Will there be a difference in the water effects if you are using DX9 or DX10?

JJ: Depending on the performance gain on DX10 hardware, there will potentially be some additional details and effects enabled on these cards.

[TQ]

Odd, how this little tidbit wasn't in the "official" system specs posted on the 2K forums.
I had to dig a bit for it.

Is BioShock compatible with DX10?
Answered by Elizabeth Tobey of 2k Games:
Quote:
Many of you have been asking if BioShock would utilize DX10 feature set. The official answer is that yes, BioShock will be utilizing DX10. However, for those of you who won't be upgrading by August, don't worry. BioShock will also run with DX9.

[TQ]

From everything I've read, though, DX10 has been a disappointment. Slower to run than DX9 and no appreciable gain in graphic goodness. Not to mention if your game doesn't support ALchemy or OpenAL and you have an X-Fi/EAX capable card your game's audio defaults to some type of software rendering.

The good news on that front with BioShock is that Creative has been running an ad campaign in the current game magazines using BioShock as an example of why you want an EAX capable card while playing it.
I can only assume by this that BioShock is OpenAL compliant for those running the game on Vista. The rest of us playing it on XP are good to go, as well.