Bioshock: A Defence (Eurogamer Article)

[KagePrototype]

Nice little "hey Bioshock is totally awesome" article over at Eurogamer appeared today. It takes a few common criticisms and tries to paint them in a new light:

The game's basically divided into three, broad sections. The first third is the introduction to the world of Rapture. Here, you're lobbed into this world gone mad at the bottom of the sea, progressing through an example of how the three pillars of the society have decayed. You'll have noticed Science, Industry and Art being the three inscriptions as you enter the bathosphere for the first time - which neatly ties into the medical lab, the fisheries and the debased stage-show of Fort Frolic. This is the world. This is how it is. The middle third, broadly speaking, is about your character. Who you are, what you're doing and - eventually - how you're being controlled. You're a slave, a meat-puppet murderer guided by a nihilistic force. Clearly, this grates. You want to get out of that.

The final third, primarily, is about how this is as true for everyone else in Rapture as you, one way or another. You move from the personal nature of control to how a society has been manipulated. The training of the Little Sisters - best personified by the Pavlovian electric shock machine that rewards you for rejecting the silhouette of a woman in favour of the hulking Big Daddy shape - is obvious enough, but how Fontaine manipulated society into revolt in his favour is key. Your first sight in Fisheries is a man strung up and torn apart, with the grim sign "Smuggler" to warn off anyone trying something similar. Looking at the discarded suitcase reveals what the contraband was - Crucifixes and bibles. People killed for trying to express faith? What manner of monster is Ryan? Except that's reversed in the final third. Fontaine's charities were everything that Ryan feared and loathed, using the cover of altruism to gain a power base and willing servants. After the final third, the nature of Rapture is made perfectly clear - Ken Levine's point of unquestioningly following any pre-set belief system being not the smartest thing in the world is made precisely.

http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=88881&page=1

You don't have to agree to find it interesting, at the least.

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

I pretty much agree with that article.

"Why don't the baddies use the Vita Chambers?"

This is explained ingame, through one of the tapes.

Spoiler

Ryan programmed it to use his DNA only, and since your his son, then, y'know. This makes me wonder if Ryan is still alive.

 

[DEATHMASTER]

Spoiler

quite possibley, but where did you find out about it being his dna only?

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

Spoiler

quite possibley, but where did you find out about it being his dna only?

It was in one of the tapes. I have no idea where, but it was towards the end. It might have been in that deep sea place beginning with "H".

 

[Tagaziel]

I honestly can't be arsed to read the article once he started claiming that it isn't a dumbed down System Shock 2 and everybody who says so is an idiot.

 

[KagePrototype]

It was in one of the tapes. I have no idea where, but it was towards the end. It might have been in that deep sea place beginning with "H".

I remember finding it at the docks, underneath a boardwalk (in that first huge room).

 

[mastapenguin]

I'm a little vexed at the point when he says that the linear and uninspired final 3rd is just some sort of self-referential Meta-fable against linear and uninspired gameplay.

I mean, how convoluted can you get? He implies that 2K Boston really couldn't figure out how to break from FPS tradition, so they just made their game an example of it. So they rather conspicuously make use of the worst video game cliches ever. But then, wouldn't that imply more dialogue into the helplessness of the Little Sisters? Or, perhaps, the inability of the Splicers to make decisions for themselves? The arching theme of self-control all but disappears in this section, which makes the journalists point rather suspect. And seriously, the point that "Bioshock is smart, so it doesn't have to explain itself". If that is Bioshock's Modus Operandi, it just means that NOT ONLY are the developers unable to break themselves from the FPS culture the criticize, BUT ALSO they are too elitist and Avante-Gard to explain themselves to their customers.

I still think Bioshock is an outstanding game, far better than many other FPS games out there. But I rather believe the final third is just the developers trying to meet a deadline.

 

[99.vikram]

"These are elements of Shock 2 which, frankly, most people thought were a bit rubbish."
-That's the last line I read. System Shock 2 won accolades for a reason, and for this guy to ignore that is unforgivably stupid, IMO. Some elements might have needed tweaking, but NOBODY who played the game wanted features removed. Stop apologizing for Boston 2K, journalists. Yahtzee was spot on.

I lie. I also read this:
"Shock 2 was one of the greatest games of its period."
- And that's an excuse to copy it's core mechanics? He goes on to say that more games ought to do that.

Bioshock is awesome game and GOTY material, but by no stretch of the imagination is it as innovative or gripping as System Shock 2.

 

[venturon]

God, how did I know this article would be written by Kieron Gillen?

I love his little critical analysis excusing the flaws of the third section, as if its poor quality is a kind of artistic statement instead of an indication that the story ran out of steam and the developers had to slap an ending on it. And his rant about repetition is equally ridiculous. There's a reason why I wrenched my way through almost the entire game, and that's because none of the alternatives I was presented with were interesting, and the enemies were all so predictable. Coincidentally, I also used the baton through the majority of DE:IW, his example, for very much the same reason. It doesn't have anything to do with efficiency.

I could hardly disagree more with Gillen's assessment. Bioshock doesn't reward the astute player, it punishes them. The actual interesting parts of the game are drowned in tedious gameplay, and about two-thirds of the way through any semblance of depth or atmosphere dissipates almost entirely. The astute player is better off reading Ayn Rand, because ultimately Bioshock fails to deliver thematically, and the impotent conclusion leaves most of the game's story without relevance or impact. It's like the Matrix Reloaded--you can throw in as many Biblical and Classical references you like, but it won't make your story any more than load of meaningless referential wankery. Thank God at least the early bits of Bioshock were enjoyable.

God damn, I cannot stand Kieron Gillen (or the Wachowksi Bros).

 

[Narcolepsy]

The problem with that article is that Bioshock is an amazing game in spite of its faults. Attempting to explain away its faults is folly, and to imply that the last third of the game wasn't a disappointment is just stupid.

 

[Rico]

The astute player is better off reading Ayn Rand, because ultimately Bioshock fails to deliver thematically, and the impotent conclusion leaves most of the game's story without relevance or impact

I don't think I really understand what you're saying here, are you saying you think that Bioshock was meant to reinforce Ayn Rand's ideas?

Bioshock's story was precicely about why Ayn Rand's idea of a "perfect society" would never work. I thought the conclusion was as powerful as you're going to find in an FPS these days. Quite frankly, story-wise, I'd put Bioshock at the top of the rung of FPS stories. In a genre where the majority of plots are cheesy sci-fi and action movie cliches, it's refreshing to have a game that attempts to tell a story rather than just give the player an excuse to bash and shoot his way through a virtual world.

Also, Ayn Rand's books are some of the worst written literature I've ever read. I don't care about what ideas you're trying to convey, if you write a book meant to read like a novel, I'll judge it as so. Atlas Shrugged was the most boring, worst-written book I've read in a while. Her characters are caricatures of humanity, whose sole purpose is to attempt to prove her theories and ideologies right and are impossible for the reader to even attempt to connect to.

I felt like I was reading smut when I read Atlas Shrugged.

Bioshock did a far better job at communicating Rand's ideals than she ever did, and that, is quite sad indeed.

 

[Pesmerga]

Why didn't the bad guys destroy the Vita Chambers?

 

[Cerpin]

Because they were under the control of Andrew Ryan, and the chambers were designed for him.

 

[Herr Mike]

While a brilliant attempt, the story was too ambitious for it's medium. We needed more of the story. More of Ryan, more of Fontaine, Tannenbaum, Suchong, etc. More of your own character. Basically, less gameplay, more story. You don't need a splicer or a turret waiting around each corner. If anything, that hurt the sense of isolation you should have felt.

But, I'm not the archetypical gamer. I don't play an FPS just to shoot stuff. Been there, done that. I play for the immersive experience. Half-Life 2 wins over Bioshock for this reason. It's a completely immersive world and you don't get yanked out of it by having to hack something every 5 minutes or having to worry about how to use genetic modification. Bioshock could have been AT LEAST as good, if it played to it's own strengths. Rapture was easily the most inspired, best realized setting I've ever experienced in gaming.

They shot themselves in the foot by making it too similar to System Shock 2. Granted, not many xbox goons played SS2 but you have to face the facts, a lot of that stuff doesn't fit as well in Rapture as it does in deep space. It just doesn't make sense that there are ammo dispensers littered around an auditorium. Why use ammo dispensers? (I'm not sure it makes sense that they'd be on a space ship either, but it didn't grate with me in SS2).

Plasmids are fun, yes. But juggling between plasmids and guns is just another thing that keeps your mind off the saga of Rapture. It's a pre-occupation, and very gamey. Let the player choose the path from the beginning. I'm a plasmid user or I'm a gun user.

By dumbing down the gameplay, they could have had a much smarter game.

 

[Herr Mike]

I don't think I really understand what you're saying here, are you saying you think that Bioshock was meant to reinforce Ayn Rand's ideas?

Bioshock's story was precicely about why Ayn Rand's idea of a "perfect society" would never work.

Not at all. Levine is an admirer of Rand, if anything, the tragedy of Rapture reinforces Rand's thinking. Fontaine, the thug preaching altruism, destroys life with force. That is Atlas Shrugged in a nutshell. That is what happens to the United States.

It's more apt to say Rand's "perfect society" would not work because you can't get rid of the parasites and thugs.

"Adam" complicates things, but I don't think that Rand would have thought very highly of tinkering with your genetic code so that you could ignite people. You could draw parallels between Adam and Galt's impossible "electricity from the air" machine, but there is a substantial gap between a glorified generator and turning yourself into a freak.

I thought the conclusion was as powerful as you're going to find in an FPS these days. Quite frankly, story-wise, I'd put Bioshock at the top of the rung of FPS stories. In a genre where the majority of plots are cheesy sci-fi and action movie cliches, it's refreshing to have a game that attempts to tell a story rather than just give the player an excuse to bash and shoot his way through a virtual world.

But in the end that's all you do. I agree the story is great but we needed more of it. Ryan's descent into madness is not well illustrated. Fontaine falls victim to a common Atlas Shrugged critique - he's just a one dimensional thug.

Also, Ayn Rand's books are some of the worst written literature I've ever read. I don't care about what ideas you're trying to convey, if you write a book meant to read like a novel, I'll judge it as so. Atlas Shrugged was the most boring, worst-written book I've read in a while.

I thought it was pretty gripping. Why was it so badly written?

Her characters are caricatures of humanity, whose sole purpose is to attempt to prove her theories and ideologies right and are impossible for the reader to even attempt to connect to.

Well yeah, she wanted to prove her point. She had a message, if she'd been wishy-washy about it, it wouldn't have resonated so powerfully. Her ability to keep things black and white and never mince words is why her work and thinking has endured. Bash it all you want, you can't deny the power of her ideas. She must have done something right.

I felt like I was reading smut when I read Atlas Shrugged.

Somehow, I get the idea you didn't actually read it. You're paraphrasing amazon reviews here. :bounce: Those people probably didn't read it either.

Bioshock did a far better job at communicating Rand's ideals than she ever did, and that, is quite sad indeed.

No it doesn't, that's stupid. Yes there are parallels. Ryan's city is destroyed the same way the USA was in Atlas Shrugged, or the same way Reardon Metal or Taggart's railroad are destroyed. No, Rand doesn't address the fact that there will always be scumbags like Fontaine and thus the practicality of implementing her ideas wholesale is shot to heck. But that was never the point. She wanted people to take her ideas in and assimilate them into how they see the world, not to storm Washington with copies of Anthem.

But if you are referring to how Rand always said that blasting electric goo from a gun would work better than blasting liquid nitrogen, then yes, the game bears that out well.