BioShock Video Game Included in Smithsonian Exhibit

2K Games announced that the winner of the 2007 Game Critics Game of the Year award, BioShock, has been selected for inclusion in the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s “The Art of Video Games” exhibit that will be on display in Washington, D.C., March 16, 2012 through September 30, 2012. Along with other games selected for this honor, BioShock will represent the action genre on the current generation of gaming platforms.

BioShock was developed by Irrational Games, one of the industry’s leading studios, and has sold over 4 million units since its release in 2007. Of the 240 titles selected by the exhibition curator, Chris Melissinos, and reviewed by the exhibition’s advisory group consisting of game developers, designers, industry pioneers and journalists, fans cast their vote and selected 80 games to represent the industry in one of the first exhibitions to explore the forty-year evolution of video games as an artistic medium.

“The thought of seeing BioShock on display next to Georgia O’Keeffe and Thomas Hart Benton is, well, humbling,” said Ken Levine, president and creative director of Irrational Games. “The fact that gamers put us there makes it all the better.”

In BioShock, players fight to survive in the failed underwater utopia of Rapture, a once-glorious city that had since been torn apart by civil war and populated with genetically modified enemies. In 2012, players will leave Rapture to head to the skies of Columbia, when Irrational Games unleashes the newest entry into theBioShock series – BioShock Infinite.

“When I worked to put together the list of games, with input from the advisory group, for ‘The Art of Video Games,’ I looked for games that ran the gamut of art, social commentary, storytelling and artistic license, and BioShock combined these elements in new ways,” said Melissinos. “Ultimately, the fans got the final say regarding the games they believe best represent the medium and we’re extremely pleased with the results.”