The original Bioshock is by far the most gratifying experience i had in this generation. It not only has THE best intro in the history of gaming, it had by far one of the deepest and most thought provoking stories in recent gaming history and in the age of dumb and racist military shooters, dudebro third person shooters and cinematic gaming, that's saying a lot. Andrew Ryan is still one of the deepest and most well developed villains in gaming history and very few can actually top him in terms of character, charisma, motivation and intelligence.He is not a guy who simply wants to take over the world simply because he is evil, he has a lot of ideological reasons for creating rapture. It also presented one of the best plot twists in gaming history and the kind only a video game can pull off! It wouldn't have nearly the same impact if it were a movie or a book. All the other character like Atlas and Fink are very memorable with a lot of quotable lines.
The city if Rapture is one of the most realized cities in recent gaming history. A lot of the rooms have small intricate details that reveals a lot of secrets about the city and, from it's prime to it's downfall. and the city is alive where you could see big daddies roaming around in areas you can't reach, splicers attacking each other, that doctor who will stand behind you and do nothing when you reach the clinic and search for items and how despite not being an open world game,everything is connected to each other and feels like a real city underwater instead of a video game level
Gameplay wise is a bit on the clunky side but it's still quite fantastic, having great variety of weapons, variety of different ammunition for each weapon, all the different amounts of plasmids which adds a lot of variety to the gameplay. You can deal damage, crowd control and even lay traps which adds a lot of strategy to it. Especially when you fight the natural enemy which is the big daddy, whom he won't fight you until you attack him to either take Adam (which you'll need to buy upgrades) from his little sister and killer her in the process or saving her to get a reward from a woman who tries to save them later on. This all involves into a sort of moral choice system which determines that ending of the game.
Bioshock is one of the gems of this generation and one of my all time favorite games. I just wished it stopped there and didn't have sequels.
Runner up games :
Super Mario Galaxy 1 & 2.
Demon's Souls.
Red Dead Redemption.
Portal.
Bayonetta.
