BioShock Remastered, along with the rest of BioShock: The Collection, is currently $9.99 on the Xbox Store thanks to the Black Friday sale. All three of these games run at 4K and target 60 frames-per-second on Xbox One X, so I thought hey — why not see what they’re like on Microsoft’s newest machine? To start, let’s take a look at BioShock Remastered on Xbox Series X.
I first want to talk a bit about this history of this particular title. It is a remaster, not a remake, of a game that came out on the Xbox 360 in 2007. It was originally remastered for the Xbox One in 2016, and then got an update for the Xbox One X in 2020. Really, we’re sort of lucky BioShock: The Collection got that latter touch-up. Not many companies would go back and make that happen. For that, 2K deserves some props.
That said, a remaster is just a fresh coat of paint on something older. BioShock came out 13 years ago, and though the game still looks good, it won’t blow you away.
In my time with it, I found BioShock Remastered to run fairly well. The frame rate holds to a pretty steady 60 FPS, and again, it’s not like this is an ugly game to play. If there’s one thing I can point out, though, I did see a bit of something Digital Foundry mentioned when the Xbox One X update dropped this past June. When panning the camera, there is an ever so slight stutter that occurs in the animation. This was an issue a few months back, and it still seems to be present when running BioShock Remastered on Xbox Series X.
Perhaps you’ll get by without noticing it. If you’re deep in the action, maybe you’ll be able to ignore it. If you’re someone who can’t help but see things like this, though, it’ll be tough to unsee once you catch it happening. I don’t have high hopes with regard to this getting fixed, either. If it’s been present since June, it’ll likely stay present for as long as this game is sold.
That said, this little bit of hitching isn’t a total dealbreaker. I certainly might have felt differently had I paid a full $60 for BioShock: The Collection. But for $10, it’s something I’ll learn to live with. And again, depending on who you are, you might not even notice it.
There is one other nitpick I have about BioShock: The Collection as a whole that isn’t related so much to the visuals as the game itself. I had to perform capture on this using an external card that tops out at 1080p. Typically, I use recordings straight from the Xbox Series X itself, which allows for 4K/60 FPS video. Unfortunately, BioShock: The Collection appears to block screenshots and video clips of all kinds. Why? I genuinely have no idea. I honestly didn’t even know this was a thing games could do until I experienced it myself.
That minor gripe aside, I still think you can have a good time with BioShock Remastered on Xbox Series X. Yeah, the camera/animation thing is unfortunate. But for $10 — $3.33 per remastered game, essentially — it’s at least worth taking for a spin.