BioShock Ships 1.5 Million, Garners "Universal Acclaim" on Metacritic

Take-Two Games chairman Strauss Zelnick revealed that the hit FPS BioShock has shipped 1.5 million units, and implied that sequels are on the way.

According to a report by Gamespot, Zelnick said, "I'm particularly pleased with the tremendous market response to 2K's BioShock," during a conference call with analysts following the company's third quarter earnings report. "It is reported we are the top-selling title at GameStop, less than a month since launch. We have already shipped more than 1.5 million units. Clearly we have a new hit franchise on our hands."

Zelnick repeated the "franchise" comment later when comparing its potential to that of the Grand Theft Auto series. "I expect we would apply roughly the same strategy to BioShock, because BioShock is shaping up to be a very important franchise," he said. "I don't want to say more than that about BioShock because I certainly don't want to jinx it, but I feel awfully good about where that is going."

Take-Two also announced yesterday that BioShock was the all-time highest-rated Xbox 360 game on Metacritic, as well as the year's highest-ranked game across all platforms, garnering an aggregate score of 96/100 across 29 reviews. The BioShock demo also set a record for "fastest to 1 million downloads" on the Xbox Live network. "We are really pleased that Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace has managed to attract a record number of gamers to its site to download and check out BioShock," 2K Games President Christoph Hartmann said. "We're excited about the reception the fans have given BioShock and are honored that the game has been recognized as "Game of the Year" material."

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Malygris:
Zelnick repeated the "franchise" comment later when comparing its potential to that of the Grand Theft Auto series. "I expect we would apply roughly the same strategy to BioShock, because BioShock is shaping up to be a very important franchise," he said.

Oh god. No. Please, no!

Joe:

Malygris:
Zelnick repeated the "franchise" comment later when comparing its potential to that of the Grand Theft Auto series. "I expect we would apply roughly the same strategy to BioShock, because BioShock is shaping up to be a very important franchise," he said.

Oh god. No. Please, no!

Unless he's talking about turning it into a movie franchise. Otherwise I hope they don't make an actual direct sequel or prequel of BioShock maybe the next game will have the same type of relationship to BioShock as BioShock has to System Shock 2.

The setting of Bioshock hasn't exactly been exhausted - it just means that the next game set in Rapture can't have a story anything like that of Bioshock.

Bongo Bill:
The setting of BioShock hasn't exactly been exhausted - it just means that the next game set in Rapture can't have a story anything like that of BioShock.

But that's just the thing, large parts of the history of Rapture have already been told in detailed. So if another game was made in that exact setting they would be constrained by so much mythos it would cramp any creativity they would bring to the project. It would be like trying to make a Starwars game that took place during the same same era as the movies.

Haven't played it yet, but there's something about it that really screams "one-off" to me. It's hard to get much of a vibe from a game when it hasn't even been opened, but the idea of BioShock 2 just feels wrong. God, I can't believe I'm even commenting on a game that's still sealed on my shelf. Maybe I'm just a little bit saddened by the fact that every successful game these days has to become a franchise.