The following is one of two papers I wrote within 24 hours as part of my assessment in the Game Studies unit at the University of Portsmouth . Needless to say this contains spoilers.
Bioshock (2K Boston, 2K Australia, 2007) is a first-person shooter as defined by Bateman & Boon’s (Bateman & Boon, 2006) theory of definition by genre nucleation which states that a genre term arises when a significant amount of games of a similar type appear to warrant an umbrella term, usually ascribed by the gaming press. As examples of the game type may have existed before the term was coined it is better to use the game that nucleated the genre as a yardstick.
Bioshock is the result of 5 years work (Houlihan, 2006) on the part of developers 2K Boston and 2K Australia and was received to critical acclaim in August 2007 receiving a Metacritic (CBS Interactive) score of 96, ranking it as the number one Xbox 360 game of 2007 (CBS Interactive).
For the purpose of defining the area of culture as it pertains to games I will be using Aarseth’s subdivision of games as outlined in “Playing Research: Methodological approaches to game analysis” (Aarseth, 2003), specifically that of Game-world, covering elements such as “fictional content, topology/level design, textures etc” under such perspectives as “Art, aesthetics, history, cultural/media studies”.
Garin & Perez (Garin & Pérez, 2009) argue that the game has two lines of narrative within it, that of the player character, Jack, and that of the citizens of Rapture as experienced through sound recordings placed throughout the game world. I would see this as a fair assessment as it is unnecessary to pick up and listen to any of these sound files in order to play and enjoy the story that unfolds around Jack. For that reason I will not discuss the audio files within this paper though recognise their strength in support of the main narrative.
The story of Jack sees him discover Rapture after a mysterious plane crash sequence that sees the character pull a revolver out of his suitcase. The game then cuts to him under water swimming to the surface where we see the wreckage of the plane and are herded by a wall of fire towards a monolithic lighthouse. As a player we are left with questions such as “Where am I?”, “What happened?”, ”Why is there a lighthouse conveniently in the middle of the sea?”. The gasping breath audio along with that of the groans of the sinking plane create a sense of urgency as the player moves towards the lighthouse. Upon entering the door closes behind the player invoking the old horror film archetype and a disquieting rendition of “Somewhere Beyond the Sea” plays over a tannoy as we are greeted by a giant bust and the dogma “No gods or kings. Only man”.
This is our initial introduction to the world of Rapture and Jack’s discovery of both the city and his part within it. As the game progresses we discover that the utopia initially viewed from the bathysphere as we descend toward the city and depicted by Ryan is not all it seems. We leave the bathysphere (disturbed and potentially shaken after our first experience with a splicer) to find abandoned suitcases and protest placards, the designers using the environment to inform the narrative. Weise posits that “The concept of a utopia gone wrong is a framing device, a way to make the player’s solitary journey through a treacherous world coherent. One can trace Bioshock’s use of this device back to Ultima Underworld and System Shock.” (Weise, 2008) This refers to the previous works of Creative Director Ken Levine who worked on both titles at Looking Glass Studios and Irrational Games respectively. In addition it may possibly have been shaped by Levine’s previous time as a professional screenwriter (Minkley, 2007).
The story is influenced by the works of Aryn Rand and George Orwell (Perry, 2006) as well as films such as Logan’s Run (Minkley, 2007) and follows Jack’s journey through this dystopia. Along the way we are introduced to a number of disturbing characters including Dr Steinman and his Picasso like interpretation of beauty applied to the human form who writes “aesthetics are a moral imperative” and “ADAM denies us any excuse for not being beautiful”(2K Boston, 2K Australia, 2007) in blood on the floor and walls of his medical centre which continue to add to the impression of Ryan’s utopia being a good idea gone wrong.
The most important of these characters are arguably the Big Daddy and Little Sister. First introduced in the station area, the splicers (ADAM/plasmid mutated citizens of Rapture) that hover over Jack’s semi-conscious body make it clear the Big Daddy is to be feared while there is a discord between the assumed innocence of the accompanying little girl and the disappointment she expresses at your survival, added to by the reference to the giant metallic behemoth guarding her as “Mr. Bubbles”. It is later exposed to the player that the Little Sisters are the creation of Dr. Tenenbaum and the player has the choice over whether to save these girls or harvest ADAM (the game’s resource) from them. This choice in turn has a narrative impact, with different endings being presented dependant on the actions of the player. The decision as to whether to harvest these creatures was on a personal level a difficult one, with a little girl of my own I found the moral decision of harvesting the ADAM for my own gain too difficult a choice to make, a sentiment echoed by Tavinor:
“But when confronted by the choice, I couldn’t bring myself to harvest the Little Sister; in fact, the prospect of doing so made me feel queasy.” (Tavinor, 2009)
Throughout the first half of the game the player is led by another important character, that of Atlas, who guides Jack through the ruins of Rapture. Bossche (Bossche, 2009) argues that we feel able to trust Atlas as his motives seem to be similar to those of the player, he wants to escape too. This combined with the old adage of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” gives the player a compelling reason to believe the character. This level of trust builds to one of the seminal moments of the game in the twist revealing Atlas as the criminal Fontaine and that he has manipulated the player into killing their own father. Things such as the speech by Ryan about “a combination of our efforts, a Great Chain of industry” which is depicted in areas of the game environment and also on Jack’s wrists, had new resonance as a foreshadowing device for the plot twist in a way not dissimilar to the way audiences looked back on “The Usual Suspects” (McQuarrie, 1995) and retrofitted things they had seen into what they now knew.
The world of Rapture has been described by some as a character in itself and as already described is used to help convey the narrative. The city is based on an Art Deco style as commented on in the Bioshock art book, “Breaking the Mold” which summarises the feel of the game quite succinctly:
“Each room feels lived in, with lives scattered around in the objects you encounter. By looking at these concepts, you can see a once vibrant world, now drowning in ruined ideals, being swallowed by the ocean it so callously believed it could keep out.” (2K Games)
This is also reinforced by Levine in an interview with Gamespy in which he states:
“…Ryan’s philosophy to me, really comes out as Art Deco. It’s a style that says, “Yes, we are men, and we control the universe!” We’re looking into the future. That’s what I’d hear growing up in New York, and I’d go to the Empire State Building. When we talk about art direction, it’s also about models and polygons, as well. We wanted to create big, bold shapes without going into too many details.” (Gamespy, 2007)
It seems clear that the emphasis was on creating a strong artistic style to accompany and help inform the player of the strong ideology of the city’s founder. The use of giant busts of Ryan gives the player the impression of him as an egotist which is somewhat reinforced by his mantra “Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his own brow?” and can be combined with the aforementioned “chain of industry”. There is a definite contradiction in that the very first statement of Ryan’s we see, “No gods or kings. Only man” and the almost religious iconography used in the architecture of the city.
As previously mentioned the player’s decision over whether to harvest or save the Little Sisters has an impact on the ending, which comes following a relatively traditional boss battle with Fontaine. This is however a bit heavy handed as illustrated by Crowshaw’s review (Crowshaw, 2007) where he states “There are only two endings, a good one and a bad one and the difference between them is rather jarring, in the good ending you are a virtuous flower child… and in the bad ending your some kind of hybrid of Hitler and Skeletor…”
In summary the main thrust of the story was for me a resounding success and although within certain fields of game studies invoking a film might get me strung up from the nearest tall bough, the plot twist within the game reminded me of some of the best moments in film narrative (the aforementioned Usual Suspects).
Bibliography
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