08/29/07—A multitude of users are reporting that they are unable to play Bioshock on their PC today due to what is likely a patch by either 2k or AVG or perhaps a combination of the two.

When users try to launch the Bioshock Main Executable to play, if AVG Antivirus is installed, it hits on Bioshock as a virus and will not allow it to launch.  Even if users tell AVG to ignore the file, it will not launch.  Healing or quarantining the file leads to equally messy results.  Healing the game’s .exe file renders it unplayable, though the virus warnings will stop.

Compounding the problem is that if users try to uninstall and reinstall the game, at the tail end of the install, the game attempts to autopatch, which fails: Windows generates a message indicating that the patch has an “invalid signature file” and cancels both the patch and the install.

The Fix:
Per 2k Support today (whose phones are apparently overheating about this issue), AVG has been notified of the problem and is working on a patch.  Until then, the only way to reinstall the game is to completely uninstall AVG, then after rebooting, do a clean install of Bioshock.  KEEP YOUR SAVEGAMES WHEN YOU UNINSTALL BIOSHOCK, they will still work.  For unknown reasons, uninstalling AVG nukes both the false virus hit, and the invalid signature message on the patch.

Staff we spoke with today were recommending Avast! Free Anti-Virus software as an alternative to AVG until the problem is remedied.  We at Boot Daily followed 2k’s instructions and the game works fine again with Avast! installed. So take a big deep breath.  There is no virus attached to Bioshock’s main .exe file. Unless you’ve been out slumming on the net again, in which case you should be ashamed of yourself.

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