Bioshock 2 is a great game that still doesn’t manage to entirely crawl out from the shadow of its predecessor.

While it perfectly replicates the role-playing, superpower-fueled shooter gameplay that made the original game revolutionary, the story does not have the same M. Night Shyamalan narrative twist that made it genius.

Bioshock is one of the few game franchises where the setting is the star. The underwater city of Rapture is beautifully implausible, constructed in an imaginative art deco style reminiscent of the work of Hugh Ferriss, whose perspective drawings of New York buildings in the early 20th Century inspired legions of architects.

Ayn Rand would feel right at home in Rapture, a city founded on the principle that a man is entitled to the sweat of his brow and that the great should not be constrained by the small.

Its founder, Andrew Ryan, felt that government and religion-imposed morality impede achievement in art and science. The philosophy of utopia is a strong theme. Read more