Supposed BioShock 4 screenshot confirms that yes, it is a video game
I don't know about you, but this has certainly caught all of us off guard.
You're not gonna believe this. An apparent screenshot from the Bioshock game that's currently in the works has leaked online, and, assuming it's genuine, it tells us one thing we've all been hoping to learn about the title. That it's a video game.
Yep, take a look at the image, which MP1ST claims has been unearthed from the showreel of a visual effects artist working for publisher 2K, and you can see clear as day, Bioshock 4, reportedly codenamed 'Parkside', is probably in line to be one of those doodads we all like to play with a controller, or mouse and keyboard, or a dance pad.
In it, the player's holding a gun, dubbed the "Ricochet Shotgun", and is looking straight at some kind of glowing orb mounted on a stand. Maybe they're contemplating it for some reason, or maybe the player just happened to be pointed at a regular light when the screenshot was taken and everyone's about to get very excited about something you might buy for your back garden if you were Andrew Ryan.
Oh, and the words "Parkside Demo" are found near the bottom of the screen, which matches up with that aforenetioned codename Kotaku's report from 2019 had cited for the project.
Aside from that, there's just the UI, which features a health bar and what look like some plasmid powers to be cycled through in the bottom corner. Perhaps the only thing of note is that one of the powers looks to be time-based, and there's an hourglass icon in the to left corner next to the health bar. Is Bioshock 4 actually just some very unorthodox-looking DLC for Hades 2? We've got no idea.
MP1ST alleges that the screenshot is from a 2021 showreel and depicts an early build of the game, meaning that it could well already be years out of date, and therefore probably isn't worth drawing any big conclusions from in terms of what to expect from the game whenever it emerges from Rapture's basement - or the basement of wherever else it might be set. Aside from, as we said, it being a video game.
While the next Bioshock was announced to be in the works at 2K Cloud Chamber back in 2019, it hasn't been given an official name yet, so we don't know whether it'll actually end up being called something like Bioshock 4 or how it'll relate to the established entries in the series.
Series creator Ken Levine isn't involved, as he's busy working on Judas over at Ghost Story Games, a game that looks, well, quite like a Bioshock thing.