Bioshock speelt zich af in de jaren zestig en actie staat centraal. Het spel moet een open structuur gaan kennen. De speler kan hierdoor het spel in elke gewenste richting sturen. De ontwikkelaar belooft een spel waarin het aan de speler ligt welk pad hij bewandelt en welke beslissingen hij maakt.

De website Evil Avatar had een interview met Ken Levine van Irrational, de ontwikkelaar van Bioshock. Hieronder een paar opvallende vragen en antwoorden.

"(...)Yes BioShock innovates in ways you won't find in a traditional linear shooter, but we've developed a system called dynamic training that sits back and watches the player. And if the player gets lost, or clearly is not getting the game systems (for example, different ammo types vs. different foes), the system will speak up and lend the player a hand, point him or her in the right direction."

"(...)First, you have the twisted father/daughter relationship of the Big Daddy and the little Sisters. She wanders the halls of the lost city, looking for the game's most important resource: a genetic material called Adam. His role is her guardian. He protects her from the mutated scavengers who roam the hallways of Rapture.

We've done a huge amount of work on their interaction. She gets tired on long walks, he gets impatient with her, she gets excited and points out cool things she sees. In combat, his only job is to protect her. In the X06 demo, people actually got to see him lifting her up by the scruff and pulling her out of danger. It was tres cool. And it's all emergent. They're not scripted entities. They literally walk the halls of Rapture, looking for corpses to recycle the Adam from."

Lees het hele interview op deze site