For those who want a longer or more difficult Bioshock:
http://www.systemshock.org/index.php?topic=1128.0

gah. meant tom francis:
http://www.pentadact.com/index.php/2009-04-15-ending-bioshock
(spoilers, obviously)

Yes.
Though for me those are games I pick up on large sales or in bargain bins. Never a new $50+ release...
Then again, I don't think I've ever actually paid $50 for a single game...

In the middle of playing Doom 3 right now, and it doesn't seem overly long. Obviously I haven't finished it yet, but I just acquired the Soul Cube, which makes me feel I'm not too far from the end.... (15.8 hours so far according to Steam, but maybe 1 hour was spent playing with display settings.)

I kind of think that line of thinking comes from treating BioShock like a pinnacle of gaming storytelling and art, as something that stands above the norm, then being deflated when the ending makes it clear it's "just" a video game at heart.
I kind of thought it was a video game all the way through though, just a video game that gives you more and better context than most.

Doom 3 is pretty freaking long, like 20 hours. That is long for an FPS without question, and too long in my opinion.

Well, apparently there's a 1 hour 25 minute speed run on Nightmare difficulty (not counting loading screens)...
Though of course the Bioshock speed run is 1 hour 4 minutes, and the Quake speed run only took 20 minutes...

I guess so. I didn't hate it, i was just a little disappointed, and couldn't help imagining how it could have been better.

The game is short as. I mean have you really played it as a FPS? take out the wrench power up a fireball and jump an dodge like it's unreal tournament. trust me NOTHING will pose a threat and the rate at which you find or hack for health NOTHING ever does in the game.
As for plot so you get the choice of being a tripped up junkie who won't remove the chemical taint from bioengineered gremlins, but has no qualm about murdering the countless citizens driven mad by a prevailing lawlessness oh and some crim who ended up figuring out how to work the system to get ahead in life.... or you get to play a tripped up junkie who decides yeah stuff it i'm the only law in this place so *shrugs.
I guess i'm a little jaded by it forcing you to be altered where as a normal person who just fell out of a plane in an ocean would seriously think twice about injecting themselves with some unkown biological agent that from what was shown turned people into mutant freaks unable to be reintegrated into any real society especially just cause some dude needs you're help who you never really met on anything but the radio.
The plot is seriously weak and the enemies repetative and boring, lastly it has no freakin replay value.

I've been taking my time with it, checking out all the areas, looking for extra stuff, making sure to get all plot points. I'm 13 hours in and I'm in area 8 out of 11 apparently.

After just having beaten Halo: Reach in about 11 hours and only because I died repeatedly, this is a fantastic surprise. I know there's a lot more RPG elements to Bioshock than your typical FPS, but it absolutely destroys games like Halo, Killzone, and Gears of War in terms of substantial content. This is a really good game.

I don't remember Bioshock being that long, then again, I didn't really take my time with it. I ran past most enemies and didn't go balls crazy trying to get everything.

You know a long game? that newer Chronicles of Riddick, that thing is ridiculous.

As far as the length of games go, I feel that the game itself finds it's length.

I have clocked more than 150 hours in TF2, and less than four in Portal.
I also found myself spending hours playing Fable II last night, and minutes playing Scott Pilgrim.

How long a player will spend on a game, is dependent upon the player, and personal play styles.Games should be as long or as short as they need to be.

Would you kindly rethink that thought?

Rethought and currently it's still a full of the S word premise.

If you did play through the entire game, that entire situation becomes pretty well explained.

Mate i've worked in mental health, they are not that irrassional in about 70-80% of cases at the very least. So what *shrugs he was programmed to believe he had a wife, kids and a normal life... that doesn't get broken till the end of the game up until then it's a delusion he is fully immersed in unable to tare himself away from so saids modern psychology. So my statement about being dropped in the ocean and taking a hit of mutant stim for some guy he doesn't know holds fast as a farce. If you're goin the line well he wasn't chemically altered to dellusion he was trained through hypnosis, why the pretext quite frankly if the hypnosis worked on him all he'd have to do is keep clickin his fingers on the radio every 2 minutes or so, hell if i was the psycho who did it i'd have him belch every time he met someone for fun because quite frankly it would not interfere with the mental programming.
When you think about the types of genetic manipulation available in the game and the amount of individualized lunacy, it makes no sense for the main badguy to not only use hypnosis but to ignore what would rightly be available or be so bad at it as to have the victim need the hypnotist to go through an elaborate facade after the fact his identity is already known to the main bad guys actual opponent.
You may not agree with it, but it is in fact a glaring big plot hole.
Now i trust i do not have to spend more time spelling out the faults with a game i quite frankly have no love nor care for.

It was okay. Too easy and over hyped. Was still a good game.