How BioShock Made Rapture Feel Like an Open-World

Fans of the original BioShock are avidly anticipating the release of Judas sometime in 2025. However, until the launch of Judas, the time is perhaps most ripe to revisit the other world created by Kevin Levine, the world of Rapture. BioShock was originally released in 2007 when audiences were captivated by Rapture, the supposed Utopian city under the ocean where citizens live harmoniously and separate from the conflicts of war and politics of the world above.

While BioShock is approaching nearly 20 years in age, the game remains exceptional for introducing a world that felt larger than life, despite being constrained to a fairly linear path. How did BioShock manage to create a world that felt open world despite the limitations of a linear RPG?

Environmental Expectations

“It was not impossible to build Rapture at the bottom of the sea. It was impossible to build it anywhere else,” says the visionary founder of Rapture, Andrew Ryan. Within the first few minutes of BioShock, players will be greeted with the propaganda for the foundation of Rapture and why ultimately the city was built underwater. The narrative is captivating, but it also immediately sets player expectations – if the city exists underwater there will be limitations and natural boundaries to exploration that feel organic.

As players navigate moving from building to building, there is a reasonable need for closed structures that keep the city separated from the ocean outside. Those preconceived notions from audiences reinforce the existence of those boundaries, without creating the impression of the world being limited by the game design, but constrained by the boundaries of nature itself. The developers also focus on providing reliable visual queues in the level design to keep the underwater environment at the forefront. Throughout each level, players are exposed to dilapidated rooms flooding with water, or leaky pipes letting ocean water flood in, which serves to remind the player where exactly they are located.

The World Through a Window

Within the city-scape and traversing locations like the Hephaestus Power Facility, the Medical Pavilion, or Rapture’s Farmer’s Market, players are never far from robust windows that look out into the world beyond.

Windows provide a glimpse into the soul of the world of Rapture. The initial journey into Rapture sets the journey in a Bathysphere (Submarine) slowly moving into Rapture, a sprawling city begetting to be explored. The external building facades that are seen from the window offer a sense of the culture and personality of Rapture, whilst also providing players the immensity of the city itself. And while only a fraction of the city is available to be explored across each mission, there is always the feeling of seeing and being a part of something much larger.

These views are paramount to reinforcing environmental expectation, that you are indeed at the bottom of the ocean, but it also makes the game and world of BioShock feel much larger. Staring out beyond compartment pipe windows, as sea life swims by, the only limitation of how far the world extends is based upon how far into the horizon an individual can see in an underwater environment.

Free Movement Across Missions

Progression in linear RPGs often prevents revisiting prior levels or missions once completed, leaving any incomplete side-quest or exploration unfinished. However, BioShock gives the impression of free movement typically experienced in an open-world game by allowing the player to easily revisit levels through the Bathysphere at the beginning of the level.

With each part of the city being self-contained in an underwater environment, you wouldn’t necessarily expect to freely move from map-to-map given the ocean’s environmental constraints. Taking advantage of those environmental constraints, BioShock utilizes the Bathysphere as a fast travel mechanic, similar to God of War’s Bifrost realm travel, to give the perception of moving freely around Rapture without limitation. From a narrative standpoint, the Bathysphere remains integral as part of the Rapture Metro to bridge different regions and parts of the city together for free movement of its denizens.

Expansive Level Maps

BioShock builds out level maps in a unique fashion by showcasing a multi-level map as several side-by-side maps and a flowchart system between entrances and exits for how to get across the level. The process of deciphering the level maps is fairly user-unfriendly for first-time players, but once more familiar, it creates the feeling that each mission is quite robust, offering countless opportunities for exploration and approach.

Those looking to pick up an RPG that feels expansive and has strong world-building elements, should consider checking out BioShock Remastered. Independent of the superb narrative and story elements of the game, the sheer scope feels substantial and offers fans of linear and open-world RPGs an unforgettable experience into the seemingly larger-than-life city of Rapture.