What’s kind of curious is these rumors floating around, and we read them on the Internet.. Oh, there’s some rumor that like, after BioShock, everybody hated Ken and everybody left. And everybody’s in the office like ‘where did this come from? I didn’t leave. Are you leaving? No.’ The answer is, after BioShock finished, nobody left... We would love to know [where the rumor came from]... It’s rough for us, because we’re like, it’s the same old team, we’re still there, still like working with Ken, we’re doing great stuff... If you ever meet Ken, he’s the most unassuming guy. He’s the biggest nerd. But what you have to do in a game is go out there and get people excited about your project... What I think people like about Ken, or what’s made him an ‘icon’ is that he tells the truth... He takes his case to the gamer, and that really gets people excited.

You heard it here! Ken Levine: Nerd, icon, exciter.

The Truth About Ken Levine [Next Generation]

Ken Levine re-negotiating contract with Take-Two [Variety]

Musically, Xbox 360 Fanboy reports that MC Frontalot, FreezePop, the MiniBosses, and Jonathan Coulton will all perform in some capacity at this year's PAX. Hopefully, they'll do a number on Texan financial development programs!

'Pimp supreme' Ken Levine to keynote PAX [X3F]

BioShock has been hailed as one of the most highly cinematic and richly plotted titles in interactive entertainment, making it extremely well-suited to film... Our ability to attract a major studio and unparalleled creative team speaks volumes about the strength of our BioShock franchise.

Full release after the jump:

BioShock Heads to Hollywood
Universal Pictures to develop movie based on hit video game from 2K Games

Gore Verbinski, Director of Pirates of the Caribbean, to Direct/Produce

BioShock Heads to Hollywood
Universal Pictures to develop movie based on hit video game from 2K Games

Gore Verbinski, Director of Pirates of the Caribbean, to Direct/Produce

New York, NY - May 9, 2008 - 2K Games announced today that it has reached an agreement for BioShock®, the universally acclaimed smash-hit video game, to be developed as a feature film by Universal Pictures. 2K Games, whose 2K Boston and 2K Australia studios developed BioShock, is a video game publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: TTWO).

The prospect of bringing this blockbuster game to life has attracted not only a major studio, but top Hollywood talent. Gore Verbinski, director of the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, is slated to direct and produce the BioShock movie. John Logan, Academy Award-nominated writer of Gladiator, The Aviator and Sweeney Todd, is in talks to do the screenplay.

The expected release date and terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

An original property developed by 2K Games, BioShock is one of the most successful new interactive entertainment franchises to launch in recent years. A critical and consumer hit, BioShock has sold more than 2 million units worldwide since its release in August 2007. A sequel to the game, BioShock 2, is planned for a release in 2009.

"We are excited that 2K Games' vision for BioShock will be carried forward in a new medium," said Strauss Zelnick, Chairman of Take-Two. "BioShock has been hailed as one of the most highly cinematic and richly plotted titles in interactive entertainment, making it extremely well-suited to film. In partnering with Universal and Gore Verbinski, we have assembled a team that respects the uniqueness of BioShock and will translate it into a powerful movie experience."

Mr. Zelnick added, "Our ability to attract a major studio and unparalleled creative team speaks volumes about the strength of our BioShock franchise. It also demonstrates how Take-Two is delivering value based on our strategy of creating and owning our industry's most powerful intellectual property."

Christoph Hartmann, President of 2K Games, noted, "BioShock fans appreciate the depth and complexity of the game, and our partnership with Gore Verbinski will introduce the world of Rapture to an even wider audience. In addition to his impressive body of work, Gore is an avid video gamer and true fan of BioShock. That was extremely important to us in deciding to move forward with this project."

BioShock: Triumph of the Imagination

Considered to be one the finest games in the history of interactive entertainment, BioShock unfolds as a deep and exciting adventure. Barely surviving a plane crash, the player lands in icy uncharted waters and discovers an undersea city called Rapture, a failed utopia whose citizens had embraced genetic engineering before the city descended into pure anarchy. Power and greed have run amok and the city has succumbed to civil war. It is a gripping game that forces the player to make complex moral choices. Fans have embraced BioShock's mysterious world filled with powerful technology and fascinating characters. BioShock is also renowned for its rich visual detail depicting a gorgeous Art Deco world set deep beneath the sea.

BioShock has earned some of the highest ratings and strongest accolades in video game history. It is one of the best-rated titles for Xbox 360™ video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, with a MetaCritic rating of 96. Numerous organizations bestowed "Game of the Year" status on BioShock in 2007, including The Associated Press, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA), Game Informer, Spike TV's Video Game Awards, G4's X-Play, Amazon.com, The Houston Chronicle and Paste Magazine. Additionally, BioShock ranked among the top 10 titles on many other "Best of 2007" award lists, including The New York Times, Time Magazine and Maxim. BioShock was internally developed by 2K Boston and 2K Australia and is owned by the 2K Games label of Take-Two Interactive Software.

Of all the games out there, I think Bioshock is the one that's the most engaging. I think the whole utopia-gone-wrong story that's cleverly unveiled to players is brimming with cinematic potential.

It's about... I didn't mention this in my presentation, I keep forgetting to... it's about damaging not the character, but damaging the player. I think insulting the player is something... to put the knife in his back, not just the character's back. Because every game has the knife go in the character's back.

But if your perception of reality is screwed with, and you're basically played for a sucker, people have an emotional response to that. It's like when you read people saying, "I just put down the controller and walked away from the game for a minute." That doesn't happen when your character gets thrown off a roof and knocked unconscious, or gets shot at and wounded.

Even if you're tired of BioShock, it's an interesting interview that hits on a number of issues.

Ken Levine on BioShock's Narrative Drive

If you want people to follow your plot, it has to be really f****** stupid. What are you doing in Bioshock? Act 1: Find the something and do something. But, the something goes somewhere. So, Act 2: You go somewhere and do something.

Miller's Crossing: Because it's the best written movie, like, ever. And if you've seen it and played BioShock, you can see the influence it had on me.

I Claudius: Blood, political intrigue and nudity. Also, insanely well written. What else could you ask for?

Return of the Jedi: Because it came with The Empire Strikes Back.

While most of the development duties sound like they'll be undertaken by the Marin studio, Take-Two's Strauss Zelnick echoed Feder's praise, saying that Levine is "critical to BioShock." 2K Boston is said to be working on a separate intellectual property for 2K Games, but hopefully Ken will be at the very least creatively consulting on BioShock 2.

That Videogame Blog points out that concept artist Ben Mauro recently put up a nice collection of concept images for a "proposed sequel to BioShock."

Mauro told the site that these are just personal images he created for an art class he was taking. The assignment, he says, was to design a sequel for a video game or movie.

Too bad, because it's some pretty amazing stuff. I liked it so much I sent a link to Ken Levine to see what he thought. Haven't heard back yet.

It almost looks as if Mauro was thinking prequel when he did this art. Perhaps this shows the making of Rapture? Check out the link for images of his tram system.

Mid-Term Update... [Perpetual Motion, via That Videogame Blog]

I think, what it is, it's a nice gateway drug. It makes people understand the principles of gaming... I think it is a nice gateway drug. I think it is going to strictly expand the market, which doesn't scare me very much... Nothing on the scale of a Wii Sports, but again, Wii Bowling is like the ultimate gateway drug and God bless them for figuring that out because there is no barrier of entry. "Hey, can you go like that?" [swings arm] That's what you do in bowling, that's what you do in Wii Sports.

While interviewing Ken Levine earlier this month for my story on the use of objectivism in BioShock we talked quite a bit about the plot. Near the end of the interview I found myself compelled to tell Levine what I thought of the game.

"I know I'm not a game developer, I just write about games," I said to Levine, steeling myself for his reaction. "But I wasn't exactly thrilled with the ending of the game. I felt like the confrontation with Ryan, the deneumont of the story, should have probably been the game's ending. It felt like you dragged it out too much after that and it ended up watering down the experience."

Then I waited, for a second, in silence before hearing Levine say he agreed.

"I underestimated, way underestimated, the impact the story was going to have on people," he said. "I didn't realize it would change people's perspective on what to expect from gameplay."

Levine said that when writing a story, deep down he never really expect people to pay attention to it.

"I didn't think they became that invested in what was going on," he said. In BioShock "you have this great mystery of your own identity and once it is solved the story is over."

"I think it was a miscalculation on my part."

I'm still a little shocked that Levine so readily agreed with me about the ending of his game, which is why I'm all the more intrigued to hear what he has to say later this morning during his Game Developers Conference talk about BioShock and storytelling.

Make sure to stay tuned to my impressions after it wraps up.

No Gods or Kings: Objectivism in BioShock [Kotaku]

While there were 100 developers who made the list, there's no way in hell I'm trawling through it and re-typing all 100 entrants. You'll need to hit the link below if you want to see the hotly-contested battle for 89th place. Instead, I'm just going to skip straight past the chaff and highlight the wheat - ie the top 10.

10: Casey Hudson (BioWare/Mass Effect)
9. Dan Houser (Rockstar/GTA)
8. Yoshiaki Koizumi (Nintendo/Mario Galaxy)
7. Hideo Kojima (Kojima Productions/Metal Gear Solid)
6. Will Wright (Maxis/Spore)
5. Greg LoPiccolo (Harmonix/Rock Band)
4. Rob Pardo (Blizzard/WoW)
3. Jason West (Infinity Ward/Call of Duty 4)
2. Harold Ryan (Bungie/Halo)
1. Ken Levine (2K/BioShock)

NOTE: Next-Gen have based this list on who they believe is "hot" RIGHT NOW. Not in 2006, not in 1996, but NOW.

THE NEXT-GEN HOT 100 DEVELOPERS 2008 [Next-Gen]

By: Brian Crecente

The sunken city of Rapture, a world of art deco aesthetics, neon sales pitches and looming architecture, is home to more than just murderous splicers and lumbering Big Daddys, it's also a surprising breeding ground for introspection.

BioShock may have been conceived as a study in nuance, a place for gamers to discover and explore at their own pace, but its dip into the ethical morass of Ayn Rand's objectivist philosophies has brought her beliefs back into the mainstream spotlight and even piqued the interest of the Ayn Rand Institute's president, Yaron Brook.

Brook, a former member of the Israeli Army military intelligence and award-winning finance professor at Santa Clara University, first took notice of the game when he discovered his 18-year-old son playing it. It's a fact that didn't bother Brook despite his son's objectivist beliefs and the game's not so positive take on the philosophy.

"My son has to find his own way in life," he said. "There are certain games I wouldn't want him to play, like Grand Theft Auto, games that celebrate criminality. But a game that might lead him to think and have him challenge his ideas, I'm fine with.

"Luckily for me he doesn't agree with the game, he still seems to believe in objectivism"

Objectivism as a central theme in BioShock was actually the result of a confluence of ideas and happenstance. The heart of the game started, as do most of Ken Levine's games, as the answer to a problem.

"How do we make an environment that feels really complete?" Levine said. "That's where we came up with a space ship for System Shock. In BioShock we said what can we do similarly and simulate fully as we could a space ship."

The answer was an underwater city, but that simply formed the game's outline, the walls that kept a player from remembering they were in a confined space.

Levine wondered what sorts of people might live in an underwater city, what would drive someone from the rest of the world.

"I started thinking about utopian civilizations," he said. "You have these traditional utopian notions. I've always been a fan of utopian and dystopian literature.

"The more I started thinking about making a compelling place and compelling villain, someone who had a real concrete set of beliefs made sense."

Enter Objectivism. Levine said he had been reading Ayn Rand's books over the past few years and was fascinated with her "intensity and purity of belief."

"The surety she has in her beliefs was fascinating," he said. "She almost spoke like a super villain, like Dr Doom."
And her characters, Levine believed, projected that same intensity.

"I started to wonder, what happens when you stop questioning yourself? It becomes a set of accepted truths, instead of something you're constantly using in the lab of reality."

FLAWS IN LOGIC AND CHARACTER
Where Rand had Fountainhead's Howard Roark and Atlas Shrugged's John Galt, Levine had Andrew Ryan, Rapture's founder.

Levine said he views the game's chief protagonist as a cross between Howard Hughes and "one of Rand's characters if he were put in the real world with all of the real problems people have."

"Rand's characters are super heroes," he said. "Great people without flaws. "

But Brook says, that's not really a fair interpretation of Rand's beliefs.

"It seems to me that he's misrepresented what Ayn Rand believes and her ideals beyond objectivism," he said. "He's setting it up to fail. He believes , based on what I've read, that any system that is absolutist is ultimately going to lead to disastrous effect. Any system of black and white, any system of ultimate morality.

"In many cases that true. But I think what lessens the game is that misinterpretation of objectivism."

Rand's characters aren't flawed because not everyone is, Brook says.

"I think its flawed logic in the sense that he thinks that people have to be flawed," he said. "I think in many respects (Rand's) books do put her characters in real life.

"I think there are great people and perfect people and I think we all should strive to be great and perfect."

That's how Levine's Ryan starts out, a "new man", an incredible individual, but in the end he fails and falls.

Ryan fails, Levine says, because while building the utopia of Rapture he never questions himself, never stopped to think if he had gone astray. And because of that he betrays his own belief system and ends up "wanting his cake and eating it too."

Despite his failings, Ryan still remains true to his ideals in the end, an important point.

"He brought his end upon himself and didn't shirk away from it," Levine said. "He wasn't a hypocrite. He may have failed, but he really believed what he did and put everything on the line for it."

THE GLUE THAT HOLDS THE GAME TOGETHER
Levine was careful how he presented to his team the idea of injecting philosophy into what was meant to be a mainstream game.

"The game doesn't lead with objectivism," he said. "I didn't pitch it to the team that way. If you pitch it that way to the team you're going to get the wrong game."

So initially, the team concentrated on capturing a time period. They studied furniture from the pre and post-war period. Levine went out and took pictures of New York architecture. They brought in Jack Beatty, senior editor of The Atlantic Monthly, to talk about the time period. Levine also brought in a few copies of Rand's books.

"There was a bit of an education process," he said. "The artists mostly had to think about the art deco stuff, I wrote about 95 percent of the dialog."

Late in the development process Levine decided that the game and the underwater city of Rapture needed more propaganda, things like the larger-than-life bust of Andrew Ryan and its slogan: No Gods or Kings. Only Man and the constant barrage of public service announcements.

"I felt the philosophy wasn't coming across enough, " Levine said. And objectivism "was the glue that holds the aesthetics together."

A CAUTIONARY TALE
Levine says he didn't set out to torpedo objectivism with BioShock.

"I think I'm more sympathetic to it," he said. "I find a lot of positive in it. I find her notion of selfishness is very interesting, not living for the abrogation of others, believing in the individual man as the central powerful force in the world rather than a government or a supreme being, the reintegration in belief of man/woman.

"We live in a country where atheists are distrusted, but you can be proudly religious and proudly political, but to reject those things and be proud of it I think that's a very brave woman.

"But I'm not a person who buys anything hook, line and sinker. I view life more as a buffet style.
"When I look at anything in my life one of my saving graces is the ability to step back and examine things. It's very easy to get mired in ideology."

Levine said he actually wrote the story of BioShock as a fan of Ayn Rand's precepts.

"I'm probably way more similar to her in my terms of how I think about religion and politics than any other philosophers," he said.

But Levine believes that Rand would reject that take on philosophy, that Rand believed it was "her way or the highway."

So BioShock wasn't meant really to be a game about Rand's beliefs, but more about her intensity.

"I wasn't setting out to make a game about objectivism, I was setting out to make a game about someone who had a very strong belief in a philosophy that was similar to this philosophy.

"It's a cautionary tale about wholesale, unquestioning belief in something."

While Brook cautions he hasn't played the game, his take on what Levine was trying to do with the story and its use of philosophy is surprisingly similar to what Levine himself says.

"My general sense is that the game's author is suspicious of any absolute philosophy and clumps objectivism in there," Brook said. "While he sees certain virtues in it, he thinks anything taken too far ultimately leads to disaster."

GUNS, EXPLOSIONS AND PHILOSOPHY
"Some people just like to blow shit up and some people like to think about the themes and the metaphors," he said.

And there were plenty of both in BioShock. Take for instance the disturbingly symbiotic relationship between the Little Sisters and the Big Daddys.

"The more you know about objectivism the more interesting the little sisters become," Levine said. "The little sisters are an examination of the question: Do the means justify the ends"

The weapon dispensers found throughout the game are meant to be another metaphor.

Rand, Levine says, is a believer in a completely free and unfettered market. Rapture and its vending machines were intended to be an illustration of what can happen when intellectual examination of a philosophy or a way of life stops.

"Some people complained about the vending machines and guns and ammunitions in the world, but there would be no restrictions on the market at all, so I could see that happening, especially if there was a civil war on."

Levine understands that not everyone wants to have a thoughtful experience when they play games, but he believes strongly in providing one for the people who do.

"I think by trying to throw some reflection on it you make people step back from the games they've played and think about it a tiny, tiny bit," he said. "But it has to be an entertaining experience first.

"The game was never intended to be a screed against Rand because I think there is a lot to like there, but if you take anything to its extremes it isn't good.

While in the end, Brook doesn't agree with what he believes to be the anti-objectivism tone of the game, he still sees it as a good think for the Ayn Rand Institute and objectivism.

"There have been a lot of people writing about the game and its connection to Ayn Rand," he said. And that's a good thing "in a sense, if you believe that any publicity is good publicity because it creates a level of curiosity and sends people to read the books. We probably had more kids going to read the book because of the video game.

"I think there is a certain benefit. Ultimately it doesn't portray objectivism well, but the mainstreaming of objectivism is important too. And it's important to see the willingness to debate those ideas even in a video game."

VIDEO GAMES: THE NEW LITERATURE
When BioShock hit, it was met with both high game review scores and a level of intellectual fascination that surprised even Levine.

"We joke that everyone should have known that a game about a pseudo-objectivist dystopia would be a huge hit," he said. "My initial goal for BioShock was to create an environment that people could buy into and to have a level of detail that you just don't see in games now. We have an opportunity to have players pull content out of the game rather than to push it at them."

But in wrapping their world around questions of morality and philosophy, Levine and his team managed to do something else, they managed to spark in some players the desire to, like Levine, step back from their beliefs, their ideologies and study them from afar.

"I like that people walk away with different interpretations," he said. "We weren't creating a polemic, we were creating a piece of art that has different meanings to different people.

"We were trying to ask questions more than answer them."

While the game can certainly be viewed as an attack on objectivism, despite Levine's intent, Brook says he really doesn't have a problem with it, or with the idea of the medium of video games taking on the challenge of dealing with an issue as complex as Rand's philosophy.

"I don't see a problem with the medium," he said. "I think it is potentially a very exciting medium with which to introduce people to ideas. I think video games replaces much of literature's impact. The literature today is dull and boring and video games allow kids to experience the heroism that the books don't provide them.

"Who knows where the medium is going I think that's one of the exciting things about video games and technology. I think it will be interesting to see what kind of issues they take on."

This may disappoint some people with this, but the game I'm looking forward to in 2008 is Smash Bros [Brawl]...[and] now that I finally managed to crack my way into Outland, I'm now psyched for the next WoW expansion.

I had a tireless, amazing team who was on a mission to make BioShock great. We didn't have 300 people or five years. We had an insane amount of passion. I'd like to thank the people who made it with me, the families that patiently waited while we did our thing, the publisher with the guts not to make us change it, and the fans who showed that gamers have a much broader range of interest and intellect than anybody in certain parts of the media or the political space is comfortable giving them credit for.

It's a relatively short article, but there is some great stuff in there regarding his thoughts on BioShock's weaknesses as well as his pick for 2007 GOTY. A nice bit of weekend reading for your early morning coffee or late night holiday booze binge.

Ken Levine Talks BioShock [1Up]

OK, so my kids are all fascinated with Bioshock characters. Ever since I picked up my big daddy statue on launch day they've been asking me questions about big daddy. While I haven't let them watch me play the game, they have inadvertently seen it over my shoulder a couple of times. To my surprise, my seven year old came up with a may to mimic big daddy with Lego's and even threw in a little sister with an Adam extractor. I assure you he did this all on his own. My almost five year old was just overheard in the shower saying, "Look Mister Bubbles... Adam".

I had the great pleasure of meeting Ken Levine at E3 and a nicer guy you will never meet. He emailed me with his support during the time of our site hack and when I saw him again at the BioShock launch party he treated me like an old friend and even introduced me to his lovely wife... When I spoke to him, the poor guy was supposed to be on vacation, basking in the knowledge that he had just put many years of work to rest and that people were loving it. Instead, he's scrambling around trying to satisfy the needs of some vocal, angry gamers. He did admit that the PC issues were something that shouldn't have happened and he has done everything in his power to help resolve these issues to people's satisfaction... He also mentioned to me that it was his idea to offer the orchestral soundtrack for free download on the Cult of Rapture website... Their launch party was even billed as an "appreciation" party and the guests were not just people who worked for the company, but members of the press and long time active forum members from The Cult of Rapture.

BioShock was traumatizing for many. Folks are just getting over the emotional scarring! No, strike that. People will never get over server downtime, piracy-protecting SecuROM and widescreen issues. Pain like this runs deep. Game site 1Up cornered BioShock dude Ken Levine to get his thoughts.

It was a screw up on our part. I don't think we were ready. We didn't know the game was going to do as well as it did [and the] servers got overwhelmed.... So it went down 6 hours one night and that was really stupid. People had just bought the game, spent $50 and they go home and find out they can't run it. That ain't good.

It [widescreen] was the way we want it to be, but clearly not every gamer agrees with us or how the way it was implemented. Hey, they spent $50 on it, they should have the right to play the game to their atheistic pleasure, not our aesthetic pleasure... While this may make us cringe a bit to see people play ad different FOV than we intended to, it's their game.

Ken Leving Admits BioShock Probs [1Up]

Every time I start a game, I'm like, 'Oh shit, how do I do this?' You might call it organic [game design]; I might call it pulling it out of my ass.

The goal was to present players with difficult choices, 2K Boston President Kenneth Levine said.

''As a piece of art, we want to deal with challenging moral issues and if you want to do that, you have to go to some dark places,'' Levine said. ''And 'BioShock' certainly does go to some dark places.''

And killing little girls is a pretty dark place indeed. I do like how Levine pulls out the work of art card. Seems to be the norm whenever the violence of a video game is questioned these days.

The article goes on to explore gaming violence, spewing out some of the same things we've posted here time and time again. Studies, incidents, court cases, etc. Pretty much all an outsider sees of the gaming industry. What the article doesn't touch on is this one, overwhelming fact. Giggling little girls are pretty damn creepy.

Would you kill 'Little Sisters'? Quincy company challenges taboos with game violence [The Patriot Ledger via Joystiq]

I've followed up on the circular email with securom and we are working on this issue. I agree, it sucks, and we need to get that sorted.

I've been told by 2k that we will.

-Ken

2K is breaking their own license agreement [2K Forums - Thanks Kevin!]

Hey guys-

Sorry about all the conflict. IG development people (specifically Chris and Rowan who are both on vacation) were trying to take a day off today (we've been working about six months 6-7 days a week). I'm trying to see what everybody's concerns are and consult with the staff.

I know people are frustrated, but we are dealing with internet time here. It wasn't until 7 pm EST that I was able to even talk to anybody in our Australian studio, which is open today (9 AM their time).

I hear you that not everybody was thrilled with the PC launch. And I'm trying to collect information and see what the facts are. PC game development does not function in a matter of seconds or hours, especially when most of the team is on vacation. But I hear you, and we're looking into the issue. I'll only ask you have a bit of understanding as to the time scale that software development issues must occur in.

Best regards,

Ken Levine

First of all, it's really one of those games where you'll want to save often — not because you die constantly, but because you're going to want to replay rooms to try things a different way.

The 60-plus page PDF, in low and high resolution options, is now available for download at the official Cult of Rapture web site. Dozens of pages of character, environment and weapon artwork await you. Worth every penny, too.

Obviously, spoilers abound, with a special warning to avoid the art book's foreword from Irrational's own Ken Levine. Consider yourself warned: "No reading, just looking."

BIOSHOCK: BREAKING THE MOLD [The Cult of Rapture]

I remember pitching the game to one publisher who later told a friend of mine that it was 'just another fucking PC FPS that's going to sell 250,000 units.'

Pitching Bioshock - "just another f**king PC FPS" [CVG]

"Irrational Games is widely recognized as one of the most innovative development studios in the world," said Christoph Hartmann, President of 2K. "Following their incredible efforts in bringing BioShock to life, we are proud to make the newly renamed Irrational Games studios a cornerstone of our game development family."

Ken Levine seems estatic at least, in a very 'has no choice but to be estatic' fashion.

"We're proud to be part of the 2K Games family and enjoy the new opportunities and artistic freedoms this strengthened relationship provides," said Ken Levine, President and Creative Director of 2K Boston. "The name change signifies our growing position as a central part of 2K Games, and we plan to ensure our future titles continue to set new standards of quality and innovation for the industry."

Irrational Games Renamed 2K Boston and 2K Australia Standout development studio behind BioShock changes names of US and Australian offices

New York, NY - August 10, 2007 -Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: TTWO), announced today the name change of industry leading development studio Irrational Games to 2K Boston and 2K Australia. Headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts and with offices in Canberra, Australia, Irrational Games is an internationally renowned developer of story-driven, genre-defining games with award-winning hits like System Shock 2, Freedom Force, Tribes: Vengeance, and SWAT 4. The name changes to 2K Boston and 2K Australia symbolize the studios' further integration into the 2K Games family following their outstanding performance on BioShock™, the upcoming blockbuster available exclusively for the Xbox 360™ video game and entertainment system and Games For Windows on August 21, 2007 in North America and in Europe beginning August 24, 2007.

"Irrational Games is widely recognized as one of the most innovative development studios in the world," said Christoph Hartmann, President of 2K. "Following their incredible efforts in bringing BioShock to life, we are proud to make the newly renamed Irrational Games studios a cornerstone of our game development family."

Recognizing the exceptional talent and creative vision that have made Irrational Games one of the industry's premier developers, 2K Games has fostered the studio's growth by substantially investing in its people, allowing Irrational Games to almost double in size since the studio's acquisition by 2K in 2005. With the upcoming release of BioShock - one of the year's most hotly anticipated titles - 2K Boston and 2K Australia, with the backing of 2K Games, are raising the bar for forward-thinking game design.

"We're proud to be part of the 2K Games family and enjoy the new opportunities and artistic freedoms this strengthened relationship provides," said Ken Levine, President and Creative Director of 2K Boston. "The name change signifies our growing position as a central part of 2K Games, and we plan to ensure our future titles continue to set new standards of quality and innovation for the industry."

For more information, visit the 2K Boston and 2K Australia websites www.2kboston.com and www.2kaustralia.com.

...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.

I'd Like To Thank the Academy [via bluesnews]

I had the distinct pleasure of being shown BioShock by Mr. Levine himself and I must say it was the highlight of my entire E3. Being on Major Nelson's podcast and interviewing the great Sir Peter Molyneux were definite close seconds, but being the BioShock devotee that I am, Ken Levine wins the big prize.

As you may or may not have read in my last weekend's note to Ash, I will be attending the BioShock launch party taking place in Boston next month so I'll be sure to grab some pictures and bring you all the details as they happen.

In other words, this video isn't what is left on the Bioshock cutting floor, it's actually got some meat to it. Kim Phu

New Bioshock Video [Blue's News]

If you still remain unconvinced that Bioshock is going to be one of the best games of 2007, set aside fifteen minutes and watch this video as Irrational's Ken Levine leads us through one of Bioshock's sub-aqueous Art Deco levels.

Please note that Motionbox requires Flash Player 9 to view, so if you can't see it above, you have the option of going directly over to IGN and watching it, at a higher resolution, no less.

This looks unbelievable: finally, a unique setting in a video game. Set your loins to quiver. Florian Eckhardt

Need there be any further proof that EA should be immolated and salt spread on the charred earth where once its corporate empire lay than this statement from Irrational's Ken Levine?

For some reason, people think I know more about this than I do. We barely had any contact with EA during Shock 2. They weren't interested in that game. They weren't interested in a sequel. As a gamer, I'd love to see a Shock 3. I just hope EA believes in it more than they did Shock 2.

I think I speak for gamers who have had hot, sexy Gibsonian dreams about Shodan everywhere when I say: EA, you idiots. You only pissed away two of the greatest games ever, not to mention an amazing franchise and gaming's greatest villain. Florian Eckhardt

Ken Levine Talks System Shock 2 [1UP]

Ken Levine, the smartest writer in video games, gave an interview to Through the Looking Glass fansite SShock2.com about Irrational's upcoming "art deco underwater utopia participant-evolution inspired civil war" survival horror FPS, Bioshock. Subjects cover the evolution of Bioshock's story, art deco game design, the themes of horror in games, and morality in gaming.

On the latter subject Levine cites the typical moral choice of an RPG: a one-dimensional choice between good and evil.

What always bugs me about this is that it ignores the key component of what compels people to do nasty things: need. In BioShock, we put you in a terrible world that has exploited the weakest members of that world in horrible ways. Then we put you in a situation in which, in order to survive, it's pretty damn tempting to exploit the weak yourself. And there's no moral authority telling you what to do, what's right and wrong.

The people who exploited the Little Sisters in Rapture were motivated by ideology and their survival instincts. Any player who plays BioShock is going to be very tempted to exploit the Little Sisters, too, because now it's their life on the line. That's going to lead, I hope, to an understanding of how terrible things happen. It brings the player into the process of evil, and maybe makes them understand how terrible things happen, even when basically good people are involved.

Which is all very eloquently said, but ignores two aspects of what makes moral choices in games so paltry. Games simply are not dynamic enough to extrapolate those choices into subtle, pervasive, non-scripted consequences. Moreover, a player chooses to be good or evil because, ultimately, it's the same thing when you're the only sentient being amongst automotons. Moral choices in games do cover need: I need that +5 Vorpal Sword, so I'm going to kill that beatific monk.

Games can put the player in someone else's body, but until the worlds are filled with a more dynamic artificial intelligence in the non-player characters around you, they can't infuse you with that person's game world conscience. Which is why even the nicest of us simply weigh pros-versus-cons when murdering a Resistance fighter in Half-Life 2 for his shotgun. It sounds like Levine is looking to correct that with meaningful NPC AI, though. Let's see if he succeeds. Florian Eckhardt

Irrational Games Interview July 2006 [SShock2.com]