BioShock: The Collection PC requirements and upgrade process detailed
BioShock: The Collection launches later this week, and ahead of release, 2K Games has detailed the type of rig you'll need to have in order to run the remastered games. Just as well, the company has also revealed what the upgrade process will look like. The good news is that it's fairly straightforward if you own the originals through Steam, though it does get a little complicated if you own the Games For Windows Live versions.
If you own BioShock and BioShock 2 through Steam, both remastered games will appear will appear in your library on launch day – there's nothing you need to do other than sit back and wait. Those with a Games For Windows Live version of BioShock 2 will have a similarly easy time upgrading, as 2K says you'll only need to activate your game key through Steam to snag a copy of the remaster. It's owning a copy of the original BioShock where things get a little hairy.
That's because there's no easy solution to upgrading GFWL copies of BioShock. You'll need to find some kind of proof of purchase and then submit that, along with your Steam user name, to 2K Support using their ticket system. Assuming everything checks out, you'll be granted a copy of the Steam remaster when it launches later in the week.
Of course, there is no process for upgrading BioShock Infinite, as 2K won't be remastering that final release in the BioShock series on Steam since the game is already capable of running at a level similar to that of the remastered version for consoles.
Wondering if you have the right hardware to run the game? Here are the minimum and recommended PC requirements, straight from 2K:
Minimum PC requirements
OS: Windows 7 Service Pack 1 64-bit. Platform Update for Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1
Processor: Intel E6750 Core 2 Duo 2.66 GHz / AMD Athlon X2 2.7 GHZ
Memory: 4 GB
Hard Drive: BioShock 25GB; BioShock 2 25GB; BioShock Infinite 20GB; Total for all three games 70GB
Video Card: DirectX11 Compatible, AMD Radeon HD 7770 / NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560
Recommended PC requirements
OS: Windows 7 Service Pack 1 64-bit. Platform Update for Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1
Processor: 3GHz Quad-Core
Memory: 8 GB
Hard Drive: BioShock 25GB; BioShock 2 25GB; BioShock Infinite 30GB; Total for all three games 80GB
Video Card: 2GB ATI Radeon HD 7970, 2GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 or better
All in all, the requirements list isn't too bad – relatively easy when it comes to the necessary CPU and GPU, but you're going to need a lot of hard drive space to store all of these games. BioShock: The Collection launches for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 tomorrow, while it'll go live on Steam on September 15.